


Accursed

by DisasterLesbean



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Discord: Bellamione Cult, F/F, blind hermione, gorgon andromeda, gorgon bellatrix, gorgon narcissa, medusa bellatrix, only stole a bit of siren for reasons, they're gorgon sisters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-23
Updated: 2019-08-01
Packaged: 2019-08-06 06:10:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 10
Words: 28,238
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16382816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DisasterLesbean/pseuds/DisasterLesbean
Summary: We are in a catacomb of stone and yet you remain the most unfeeling thing in the room.





	1. Departure

She’s lived this life for a long time. Unseeing.

They tell her it’s a mercy she lived passed infancy. That she is blessed by Dumbledore. It feels like a curse. She was born sickly and although she survived, she lost her sight. 

Her parents are loving. They’re best parents Hermione could have asked for. They raised her knowing she’d never see and the difficulties that come with such in this world. 

Hermione learned things most wouldn’t have to. She memorized the pathways around their village. She learned to avoid main roads as the caravans wouldn’t much care about one girl in the way. She always stays behind people’s voices in case a fire or other hazard lay ahead of them. She mainly stays with people she knows. It used to be she would stay with her parents whenever they left the house but as she got older they weren’t around as much. Her father travelled to nearby villages to help heal them while her mother was busy seeing to their own village. 

As they went with her less and less it got more dangerous. She’d trip and run into people more often. She couldn’t hold it against them as they were working to support her but it made matters more tedious. 

Despite this she also found herself enjoying her freedom a bit more. It was restful to not have people constantly hovering over her. The rest of the village was sure to not let her stray into anything too dangerous. 

She went to school in the largest village nearby as all children her age did. They had initially rejected her presence until her mother showed up and argued that Hermione would understand everything said and she wasn’t to be left out. The school acquiesced. 

Hermione would always be grateful to her mother for this. This is where she went from surviving to living. She treasured the moments away from home, even if she had to learn about gods and goddesses. Her disdain of the gods persisted throughout her childhood and into adulthood. Everyone she meets will tell her how blessed she is by Dumbledore’s grace and it only makes her hate more and more. Instead, she pursues literature and poetry. She can’t read it herself but the teachers and other students would read it aloud in class. 

She can’t work an art like architecture nor can she work a laborious job like farming. Her options are limited and her future unknown.

Unknown to her, her salvation would come in the form a peculiar girl.

Before her though, she meets Harry and Ron during her first year at the school.

“How do you always know the right answer?” A voice groans miserably from next to her. She is walking through a hallway towards the carriage that takes the children home when the voice piped up.

Hermione shrugs. “It’s not that hard.” The teacher gives the answers, it’s just a matter of remembering. A different boy makes a derisive snort but doesn’t say anything.

“Could you help me? I’m terrible with dates.” The first boy asks beseechingly. “Ron’s not much help either.” He adds pointedly.

“Hey!” The second boy, Ron, replies defensively.

She can feel her irritation spike. “I won’t do your work.” 

“I’m not asking you to, just help us out so we don’t fail.” The first boy reassures her. “Oh, I’m Harry.” 

“Hermione.” She introduces herself. She considers the fact that they might try and bully her into doing their work. Her teachers give her leeway over her work so long as she demonstrates she understands the lesson, she wouldn’t even be able to do their work without being caught. Work aside, she wants friends. She hasn’t really ever had friends. Until her father’s more recent absence her parents had barely left her alone. She decides she wanted to try friends, see if they could work. “I’ll help.”

Harry, Ron, and Hermione. It’s them for years. She falls into place with them so easily. They don’t understand why she is so passionate about learning. Can’t understand what it is to be unable to see. Unable to see beauty but hear the way poets saw it. She clings to the written and spoken word with a desperate manner. 

Although it is always the three of them, others follow. A group forms. Ginny, Fred, George, Neville, Dean, Seamus, and eventually, Luna. 

The first time Luna and Hermione really talk is during an excursion into the forests.

They are prone to wanting to explore the forests near their villages. They have a sense of adventure most of the locals had lost generations ago. Most of the families are concerned with keeping the people fed and happy and didn’t seek much beyond that. Life is cycles of work and rest for most. The group of friends that slowly fell together want more than that.

Her friends are very good about her limits. They know when she needs help and not to stray too far from her due to the terrain but manage to do so without hovering as her parents do. Sometimes they want to go further then she could and she tends to stay behind. Neville usually stays with her, not wanting to go with whatever the others are so adamant about. However, this time Neville is sick and decided not to go with them which led to the conundrum of who’d stay behind with her.

The situation leads to her being entirely exasperated. “I’ll be fine by myself, you don’t need to worry.”

“No, we can’t leave you behind. There’s wolves.” Ron answers squeezing her shoulder.

“I doubt that’ll be an issue.” Hermione rolls her eyes at their worries. 

“You’d never leave one of us behind.” Harry adds.

“He’s right, that too.” Ron agrees quickly.

“I’ll stay.” Luna speaks definitively.

“You don’t need to do that.” She doesn’t want someone to stay behind who doesn’t want to and Luna has always gone with the others. The moments like these where the focus is on her makes her skin feel thin and moisture gather. She hates attention on herself for the most part and is happy to let one of the others soak up it up. Harry’s brief hugs and Ron’s jokes that made her feel like she belongs are enough. She doesn’t need the group looking at her, talking about her. Especially when it is about this.

“I want to. The spirits are very loud today.” Luna hums and sits down on a log next to her. That is the other reason. 

She’s avoided Luna up until now due to her belief in gods, goddesses, and everything in between. Several of her friends made the mistake of commenting on how she was blessed but all of them know by now her distaste for such things and never speak of it near her. They also likely know it is why she avoids Luna out of all their friends as she is the biggest believer. 

“It’s settled!” Harry claps his hands before rubbing them together. Hermione figures he is anxious over what she’ll say to Luna who he is quite fond of. She does try her best not to be rude but sometimes Luna’s absolute belief can make her grit her teeth worse than a stubbed toe. Harry also has been trying to get the two to get closer for months and is using this as another opportunity.

With barely another word Hermione is left sputtering as the others take off to climb the rather steep hill they wanted to, leaving her with Luna.

“You don’t quite like me.” Luna says more then asks. Hermione starts sputtering again for an entirely different reason. She is going to get Harry back for this.

“It’s not that!” Hermione rushes. She scratches at her wrist trying to think of a diplomatic way to put it without unintentionally hurting the girl. 

Luna lightly taps her hand before taking it in her own. “It’s okay.” She assures her. “I don’t think you’re blessed.” Luna tells her.

“Thank you?” Hermione is completely perplexed by the direction of the conversation.

“You’re not me, I don’t want to change you..” Luna clarifies and Hermione gets what she’s trying to say. She’s so used to people pressuring her into belief, devotion, sacrifice. She’s been told she’d make the perfect priestess to Dumbledore. An example of his mercy. 

“Do you often see spirits?” Hermione ventures. Even the devout often didn’t claim to see things at least not in her experience. 

“Sometimes.” Luna replies easily.

“Right now?” She asks in clarification.

“Of course.” Hermione tries not to be unsettled by that. She fails.

They sit there in silence waiting for the others to return and neither feel the need to speak. When the others come back they come as loud as a stampede. Words shouted and interspersed with loud laughs. 

“Good to see you two got along.” Ron’s relieved voice comes from in front of her. Harry isn't the only one nervous over leaving them together it seems.

“Of course we did.” Luna’s sure voice answers.

They head back towards their villages together. When they reach a crossroads where they usually split up she feels Luna loop their arms together. “I’m going with you if you don’t mind.” She whispers as if they are sharing a secret. 

“Of course not.” Hermione assures her. She isn’t sure what Luna’s recent interest in her is about but she is curious. 

“We’ll see you tomorrow in class.” Ron’s confused voice bade in farewell. Harry gives her a hug before taking off after Fred who’d messed up his hair.

Luna and she turn towards Hermione’s village and set off. Luna lives in the same village as Neville, Dean, and Seamus. The walk to Hermione’s village isn’t long but sun will be set before they reach the village. With this in mind she knows she can’t let the girl walk home alone. “You should stay the night.” Hermione offers. She’d be wracked with worry until she saw Luna in class tomorrow otherwise. 

“I’ve always wondered if I’d sleep different.” Luna replies and Hermione takes that as a yes. 

Her parents are still not home when they get there. She knows her mother will be in later that night but her father will not. He’s home even rarer then her. Hermione asks Luna if she would like anything to eat despite being ready for bed herself but Luna declines much to Hermione’s relief. Luna doesn’t speak again until they are lying side by side on the bed.

“You like learning?” She finally breaks the silence.

“Yes.” She swallows tightly. Few seem to share her interest, often she’d find her focus on studies would ostracize her if she was not careful. Even Ron, despite being one of her closest friends, has a limit to how much of school talk he can handle. 

“Why don’t you write?” Luna asks and Hermione flinches. It is rather obvious why and she isn’t sure why Luna would ask.

“You know why.” Hermione snaps harshly.

“I don’t.” Luna’s slightly confused voice answers.

“You need to see to read and write Luna.” 

“Not if you make the letters thick enough.” 

“What do you mean?” 

“Let’s try it.” Luna decides quickly bursting out of bed.

The first time they try candle wax. Luna pours wax into letters and has Hermione feel them and learn to associate the feel and shape to the correlating letter. Soon it goes from her only really spending her time with Harry and Ron to spending time with Luna and Ginny as well. They help her learn the alphabet in writing and help find different ways of creating a method that is thick enough to feel but won’t burn through paper or be obnoxiously large block lettering.

Her schooling goes even better after this discovery and her pursuit of higher knowledge becomes a likelihood. She wants to be a scholar, it is all she has ever wanted, but had thought it impossible before. It didn’t matter all that she could hear and say if she could not record her work. She has a way now, a method she works on perfecting and her teachers are supportive of her direction. 

It is in their last year that the others bring it up. Travel. They’d always been explorative children and young adults, they want to continue this. They want to board a ship and see the world before settling into their chosen professions. Originally, Hermione has no interest in this.

It would be Harry who changes her mind, it’s always Harry who can talk her into going along with their stupid ideas. Everyone assumes it is Ron, Dean even teases it’s because she is soft on Ron, but it is always Harry. His boyish easy going charm worked from the very first time he asked for her help. He reaches out for her and she can’t help but grab on. 

“It wouldn’t be the same without you ‘Mione.” Harry pleads and not for the first time.

“I want to focus on becoming a teacher Harry.” She replies kinder then she had to Ron who had tried needling her a few minutes prior. 

“Think of the experience! The things you could write and tell your students about! It would legitimize you to the other teachers.” Harry adds a sense of logic.

He finds his opening when she hesitates at that and for months will keep poking and prodding at how much it would benefit her. They don’t leave after school ends as they need to plot a course and stock up on supplies. It is a year after they finish school that they leave.

Eventually the final push she needs to join them comes from absence. Her father requests she come along with him to another village to help a young girl who like her, could not see. She had been gone for a few weeks and by the time she returns she sorely misses her friends. It isn’t even the longest she’s been away from them but it is a clear sign she’d regret not joining them.

“You wouldn’t see Neville for months! Years! Think of how much you’d miss him.” Ron is trying his daily attempt with a new flair. 

“I’ll go.” Hermione rolls her eyes at her friend’s antic.

“What! I’ve had better arguments than that.” Harry’s voice cuts into Ron’s cheers absolutely affronted. At Neville’s wounded sound Harry apologizes. “Of course she’d miss you but still.”

“I’d miss all of you.” Hermione admits. Usually she refrains from such open sentiments, preferring to show it through action instead, but she needs them to know.

“Aww!” Comes from multiple directions before she is swarmed in arms and hugs. She bursts out laughing and tries batting them away to no avail. She lets herself fall back against the weight of all them. 

“Idiots!” She can’t stop laughing, happy with her decision. She really would miss them.

Her parents take her decision better than she’d expected. They are worried about her but are used to her living her own life. Her teachers as Harry had said, are ecstatic. They believe the life experience and journey will make her credible and give her material to write about.

The complication comes from Luna and Ginny. 

She’s been expecting the two of them to go with them. It was never in the plan they wouldn’t go. When they tell everyone they are staying behind, they are all blindsided. Like with Hermione, the others start their attempts of getting them to change their minds.

Hermione herself doesn’t understand why they aren’t going until one afternoon a few weeks before their departure. The group is in a clearing in the forest that they frequented. It is going to be their final adventure out in the forests together as they will be too busy preparing to all meet up again. She laid away from everyone just resting after the long hike it took to get here when she hears Luna and Ginny’s soft voices. Trading tender affections like they’ve all heard Neville and Hannah trade. It clicks with a clarity she is embarrassed took her so long. She spends nearly as much time with Luna and Ginny as she does Harry and Ron and she hadn’t a clue.

“You absolute asses.” Hermione scoffs at the two.

“I did say Sappho was my favorite.” Luna’s tinkling laugh filters over to Hermione.

“You could have said something!” Hermione protests.

“We’ve been together for over a year.” Ginny’s says. “If none of you figured it out by now you had no hope.” She adds bemused.

“Asses.” Hermione mutters. A creep of red climbs her neck in embarrassment, she really should have seen it. “You two are perfect together.” Hermione admits. 

“Thank you.” Luna kisses her cheek happily.

On the day of their departure, Luna and Ginny hug them all for a long moment. Ginny warns her brothers to be safe and not do anything stupid. 

“I’ll miss you the most.” Luna hugs her tighter then she ever had.

“I don’t think you’re supposed to have a favorite.” Hermione laughs in the other woman’s ear.

“The water will protect you.” Luna declares with such a steel Hermione couldn’t question it. Lune tucks a lock of her hair behind her ear before stepping away. 

“Go on you lot, I expect gifts when you return.” Ginny sends them away. Her voice chokes up but she is eager to move them along. Ginny and Luna remain behind as the ship leaves harbor, ready to start their lives together.

They board the Deathly Hallow under the command of Captain Lockhart and leave their homes. 

They will never see it again.

The first few weeks wreak havoc on Hermione. She is constantly sick, easily the worst out of the group of her friends. The crew are seasoned sailors and have little issue with their stomachs like them. She has issues acclimating to the sway of the ship and keeping her balance as well as the change in diet. Slowly, she acclimates. 

The scent of fish and sea water is always present. It floods her senses until all she can smell is salt. Her quarters which she shares with her friends smell of wet wood and dirty feet. They slowly learn how to help with the ship. Everyone finds a different way to pitch in and help. It is hard work but she’s never been happier in her life. She knows the sentiment is shared amongst her friends as they’d never laughed more. The sense of adventure and wonder of what they’d discover drives them forward every day. 

The day it happens had been like any other. Captain Lockhart tells them tall tales they all had to bite their tongues over. Jokes pass between them, often at the expense of their captain, and the monotonous efforts of daily life aboard a ship continue on. 

When they first hear it, it is as if the entire crew stops moving. She too is a prisoner of her own body. Arrested at the first note. Voices so beautiful it grasps onto a person’s very being and holds them hostage. Begs them to listen, to hear their pain.

Loneliness is the only thing she cad hear. A sadness so deep she couldn’t find the bottom so long as she lived. 

That, however, is not what the rest of the crew hear. Maybe they heard the same melancholy lyrics as she had and interpreted it differently. Disregarded it. 

_“Let this madness end.”_  
 _“Set us free.”_

Has been taken to be an invitation rather than a shout to the wind. A plea to any higher force to cut the chains that bind these women to their suffering.

At once everyone comes to life, they snap into action as if it’s one shared thought, to reach the voices. Captain Lockhart shouts manic orders, the ship taking a hard turn that thrusts Hermione into the railing. The song continues, growing louder and stronger the closer they approach. The storm that lay ahead is so interwoven into the voices that the thunder signals the next verse.

“What are we doing?” Hermione shouts at Harry who hasn’t moved away from her yet. After Captain Lockhart’s first shout, Ron had rocketed to do as he said. 

“Helping them!” Harry replies simply.

“We can’t go straight into a storm for them!” Hermione argues as the wind picks up dangerously. The water batters against her, now covering the ship in a new coating of rain.

“What storm?” Harry asks confusedly.

“The storm we’re in the bloody middle of!” Hermione yells back frantically. The ship is violently rocking side to side. The thunder closer, nearly overhead. The voices eerily filling the gaps between the shouts and groan of the stressed wood. 

“There’s no storm ‘Mione, don’t worry.” Harry tries to reassure her.

“Harry please!” She begs him to see it, to feel it. A crash explodes nearby sending up a new array of shouts.

“I’ll be back, I have to help!” Harry barely explains before shooting off to help.

“Harry!” She shouts uselessly at him. The storm is brutalizing their ship and no one is stopping it. No one is turning it around or preparing for a storm. All she can hear is the rain slapping against the ship and thunder, so much thunder, and those echoing lyrics.

She is the only one who can see the storm and hadn’t the first clue how to save them.

With the most violent lurch yet, the spell is broken. The song stops, the voices quiet. The thunder storm continues to beat down onto them with no remorse. With shouts and screams they all become aware of their impending doom. The groaning of stressed wood becomes cracks of breaking wood. They crash against something and it causes the entire ship to shake knocking Hermione to the floor. It is tearing itself apart she realizes. The ship is breaking and there is nothing any of them can do. 

A loud crack sounds near her and she hears Harry screaming her name. She stands as best she can on the drowning ship and half crawls half runs towards Harry.

“Hermione stop!” He yells frantically and she froze. “There’s a divide between us, you need to jump!” He shouts quickly. His voice stands out against the screams of terror and the destruction of their ship. She can hear him so clearly it is as if he were the only one there. The rest of the crew’s voices faded as did the rest of the noise. 

“I can’t jump Harry.” Hermione’s voice tremors. She doesn’t know when to jump, how far it is, where he is exactly, or if she can make it. She can’t make the jump.

“Yes you can! I’ll catch you, I swear it. Just run towards my voice and jump when I say.” Harry assures her. She can’t make the jump. It is impossible, she will fall to her death. “Trust me.” He begs.

He is the one standing there, he’s always been there for her. He is able to stand against a storm and demand her life in return. She has always trusted him. She’ll have to do it one more time. She takes a few hasty steps back and runs. She runs towards his encouragements and for once in her life, prays. If there is any higher power in this world she begs them to deliver her to safety. To protect her friends who she knew not of their fate. 

“Jump!” Harry calls out and so she jumps. 

She falls through the air towards him. She doesn’t know how far it is before, during, or after the jump. It feels like a moment, it feels like a year. Suspended in a directed free fall with only a hope and a friend. Flying against the wall of rain, both with and against the chaotic winds. He reaches out for her and she can’t help but grab on.

“Told you I’d catch you.” He cheekily comments. Hand clasped around her forearm, tight and unrelenting. She feels herself exhale in stark relief. She made it. 

It is as he begins to pull her up that another crack shoots through the air. This time it is behind Harry, another splitting of the ship that rocks the ship and tosses its crew around. Harry is knocked back, away from Hermione. She feels his grip loosen as he falls away, torn apart. She desperately tries grabbing onto his shirt, his hands, the ledge, anything to keep from falling. It is to no avail. As she feels her fingertips graze over his, both unable to keep ahold, she knows she is going to fall.

The free fall is longer and it is shorter. A plummet to unknown danger, one that is certainly her death. She can hear Harry urgently screaming her name. It is a deep sorrowful sound. As broken as their grasp on one another. When she hits the water, it is as if she slapped into stone. The current wastes no time in tossing her around worse then even onboard. Trapping her underneath the water and slamming her against rubble. Her head is slammed against something hard, so hard it feels as if it snapped her skull in half before she blessedly loses consciousness.

She can hear the singing return before the blackness overtakes her. It is a pitiful, mourning sound. A song of guilt and apology. 

She is lost in a blackness.


	2. Arrival

_“Ginny is going to be so mad she missed this.” George laughs from his hammock._

_“Throw a right fit.” Ron adds in agreement._

_“They wanted to start their life together, I can hardly blame them.” Harry argues in their defense._

_“We don’t blame them mate, we just have the right to make fun of them for it.” Ron corrects him._

_“Losers, both of them.” Dean tosses in._

_“Big talk.” Fred says._

_“Bet he wouldn’t say that if she were here.” George challenges_

_“Definitely not.” Fred agrees._

_“I don’t have a death wish.” Dean interjects._

_“Smart lad.” Fred and George both break into laughter._

_“Just remember to stay out of too much trouble.” Hermione says pointedly at the twins. “If you two get in trouble Dean will be the last person on her list.”_

_“She’d definitely murder you both. At least I’d get my own room.” Ron sighs dreamily before the twins descend on him._

She wakes slowly, she’s disoriented and nauseous. She is soaking wet and ice cold, still half submerged in the tide. It is lazily rising and receding against her, keeping her wet and cold but no longer drowning her. Her cheeks sting fiercely against the harsh grain of sand. Her mouth is dry and prickly, the need to wet it with water untainted by salt is overwhelming. She tries raising herself onto her forearms and cries out at the burning pain she is met with. Her entire body shakes with the effort she is exerting. She tries crawling out of the water and is met with a lesser degree of pain then earlier.

The sand grits uncomfortably against her body, sticking to the wetness and covering her body. She finally pulls herself free from the water and rolls over onto her back. She is barely clinging to consciousness after the minimal effort it took to move out of the ocean. She’s worried if she succumbs she will not wake. Either from wounds too great or the dehydration she feels plaguing her. She hears a scuffle approaching her as she wanes further and hopes it is not wildlife coming to finish her off.

“I found one!” A light voice calls out before running soundly towards her. “Keep your eyes closed, girl.” The woman rushedly tells her, scooping her into her lap and further away from the water. The woman’s voice is familiar, so very familiar. 

“Is she still alive?” A slightly deeper more accented voice calls out to the woman holding her. 

“Barely, we need to get her inside quickly.” The first woman replies.

“Bella won’t like this.” The second woman argues but her hands are already working to find Hermione’s injuries.

“Damned what she likes. She could have come here herself if she wanted a say.” The first woman replies heatedly. Hermione tries to interject, to ask them who they are or what happened to the rest of the crew, but her voice won’t work. It comes out as a gargled groan and one of the women’s hands quickly runs through her matted hair in an attempt to calm her.

“It’s okay, don’t try and speak. Don’t open your eyes. We’ll take care of you.” The second woman assures her. Together they pick her up off the sand. 

It is as her consciousness slips once more, that she recognizes the voices. 

_“Do you like Ron?” Ginny asks with her head on Hermione’s stomach. Luna is sitting next to them on her bed reading. She stops when Ginny asks her question. Hermione can hear her shuffle looking towards them._

_“No, that’s just Dean messing around.” Hermione lets her annoyance at the subject seep into her tone. She doesn’t want or need Ginny thinking she is secretly harboring feelings for her brother._

_“He likes you.” Ginny tells her. There’s an uncomfortable moment where she forgets how to breathe before letting out an audible groan and covering her face._

_“Please tell me you’re joking.” Hermione begs. “She’s joking, right?” She asks Luna who refuses to get involved in Ginny’s inquisition._

_“He’s not that bad.” Ginny feels the need to defend her brother._

_“It’s not that. I love Ron you know that. I just don’t feel that way about him.” Hermione clarifies._

_“Thank Scamander for that.” Luna mutters._

When she wakes up this time she’s more coherent. She isn’t wet and she can feel the distinct heat of a fire nearby. She isn’t in her trousers and blouse anymore. She doesn’t have any pants on and the shirt she’s wearing is coarser than her previous one. She brings her hands along her body searching for how extreme her injuries are. She runs into bandages across her body and a binding across her ribs but not splints or other indicators of broken bones. Considering how much rubble she was half drowned in she finds it rather remarkable but doesn’t question it. Her fingers trace over bandages covering her cheek and something thick tied around her eyes.

“Don’t take it off.” A woman’s voice warns her, hands stilling her own. She is one of the women on the beach last time she was awake.

“What happened?” Hermione asks with a gruff voice, her throat felt raw. 

“Your ship crashed I’m afraid.” The woman tells her.

“Who else made it?” She asks the woman. At the woman’s hesitance she feels a cold trickle of fear.

“No one. Only you. I’m very sorry.” She informs her. 

Hermione feels as if her heart stopped. No one. None of them survived. Not a single friend. The people she’s known since she was a child are at the bottom of the ocean buried under the failure of their journey. Claimed before they could even reach their first destination. Dead and gone from the world in one flash of lightning. She would have to tell Ginny that she lost three brothers within the first few weeks of what was supposed to be at least a year’s journey. 

The first tear paves the way for the rest. She can’t believe they are all dead. It seems impossible. She can’t wrap her mind around the thought of never seeing them again. She feels cold and numb as if she isn’t even here. Maybe she is buried under the rubble of the ship, lost to the legions of the sea. Maybe since she spent her life spiting the gods they tossed her into this underworld where all her friends died and she lives.

“You need to breathe.” The woman tells her while rubbing her back. She tries to center her breathing but she is lost to her grief. She feels like her connections to this world are severed. She is so very alone. The woman for her part can only keep speaking in soft murmurs trying to calm her. She turns and buries her face in the crook of the woman’s shoulder who is quick to wrap her arms around her. 

She doesn’t know what she is going to do. 

Everyone had told the group it was foolish to leave. They should have stayed home, she knows this now. They were so sure of themselves. They ventured out into their forests and thought themselves explorers. They were fawns too foolish to realize it until it was too late. If they’d stayed home they would all be alive. They may have regretted not leaving but they’d be alive. Now they are gone and she is here. 

Eventually she cries herself out on the stranger’s shoulder. Embarrassment hints at the corners of her mind but she is still so numb. The woman hasn’t spoken in a while, she just combs through Hermione’s hair comfortingly. As she starts coming down from her grief, exhaustion seeps into her bones. It weighs her down and drags her back to sleep. She feels something odd graze over the top of her head but as quick as it is there it is gone. The woman sets her down and removes herself from the bed. “Sleep, you need your rest.” 

She succumbs once more.

She doesn’t dream this time. It is just a long darkness leaving her feeling restless when she wakes back up. The knowledge of her lost friends weighs heavily on her mind as she swings her legs over the side. The panging in her heart worsens at the rememberance.

“You scared Andromeda.” A voice breaks through her dark thoughts. It isn’t the woman who held her earlier. It is the second woman from the beach. 

She can't help her indignant reply that meets the accusation. “I scared her?” She’s the one who’s ship wrecked in the middle of nowhere with only strangers for company.

“She was worried you would die.”

“Why should she be?”

“She cares.”

“Why?” 

“She’s soft-hearted.”

“You’re not?”

“No.” Her definite reply stalls Hermione for a moment. It is said with an absolute belief that Hermione doesn’t think she can ever have.

“She saved me?” Hermione questions.

The woman shuffles, clothes rustling, broadcasting her discomfort. “Yes.”

“So you weren’t the one to heal me?”

“No.”

“I remember-”

“Fine, yes.” Her voice is strained with annoyance and Hermione feels a smug surge of satisfaction.

“Why?”

“Do you always ask so many questions?”

“I’m not often shipwrecked. Why?”

“Andromeda would have been unbearable if I let you die.” 

“Touching.”

“Your feelings hardly matter to me.” 

Hermione is reticent to offer her thanks to the rather cold woman. It isn’t as if she has chosen to be here and lose all her friends. Regardless, the woman did save her life. “Thank you.” The woman may be obstinate in being as difficult as possible but her parents made sure she understood the importance of ingratiation. Especially when she takes the fact her life is in the balance of these women’s charity into mind. 

“Save your thanks for my sister.” The woman replies. Somehow her voice grows even colder after a moment of hesitation at Hermione’s gratitude. 

Hermione presses a hand to her straining ribs, the throbbing getting worse as the conversation wears on. “Where are we?”

“Nowhere you’ll find on a map.” Hermione grits her teeth against the vague useless comment. Of course it isn’t on the map or they would have seen it while they charted their course. 

“Thanks.” She replies drily. 

“Cissa, you aren’t hassling your patient are you?” Andromeda’s voice cuts in from Hermione’s right, if she had to guess she would say that is the entrance to the room. Her stress of the word ‘your’ caused Cissa to respond with what almost sounds like a hiss to her.

“She’s your patient, you take over the great inquisition.” She huffs out at Andromeda. She briskly leaves the room without a word. She audibly knocks against Andromeda on the way out. 

Andromeda walks over towards Hermione. She sets her hand on her forehead to check her temperature. “Don’t mind her.”

“Is she always so...personable?” 

“She’ll ease up.” After making sure Hermione isn’t going to die of a fever she moves to tend to the fire. She once more wonders why the sisters are helping her, they aren’t getting anything out of it. She can only hope it is a care done through mercy, she didn’t have anything to repay them. If they are going to attempt to blackmail or sell her back to her family they wouldn’t get enough in return for the time it would take to heal and return her.

She decides on the direct route. “What are your plans for me?” She hears Andromeda’s sigh and knows her worries are valid.

“It’s complicated. What’s your name?” 

“Hermione.”

“Well, Hermione. It’s a little complicated. No one is meant to find this place.” Her voice is tired, as if she hasn’t slept since this the Deathly Hallows crashed.

“Will you kill me?”

“What? Of course not! That’s not even an option. We didn’t save you to kill you.” With Andromeda’s heated protest she feels her throat loosen.

“Your sister agrees?”

“She may be abrupt but she doesn’t want you dead.” 

“And the other?”

Andromeda’s stammers out her reply. “If she knows what’s good for her she’ll listen to Narcissa and I.” After a beat she adds, “How’d you know about her?” Her tone is different from what Hermione has heard so far. It is cold and guarded, wary. More like Narcissa than like Andromeda. It is different from what she thought is normal for the woman but it didn’t sound out of place. It isn't a foreign sound. It fits the woman like a second skin and that terrifies Hermione.

“I was still awake when you found me.”

For the first time since she woke up she felt true fear for her future. Andromeda had assured her she wouldn’t kill her but mentioning her other sister seems to have tested that resolution.

“I see.” Comes the calculated response. Between Narcissa and Andromeda’s attempts to comfort her on the beach, she thought Andromeda realized she was awake.

“Then what’s to be my fate?” She reiterates.

“That hasn’t been decided yet.” Hermione lays back down tired with the lack of answer both sisters gave her. “I see you’re tired, I’ll leave you to rest. I’ll have an answer for you next time you wake up.”

Hermione hears her stand and make her way out of the room. There is no drag of the door or rattle of chains which meant there was no barrier keeping her in. She couldn’t exactly make an escape with no ship and no idea where she is but maybe she can find a village. With the ambiguity that the end of the conversation brought she needs to make her presence known to more than the sisters. 

With that thought she starts getting up as quietly as she can in case Andromeda isn’t far. She takes the useless covers off her eyes as the pressure digs uncomfortably into one of the wounds on her face. She starts her approach towards where she heard both sisters leave, hands outstretched to feel her way out as safely as possible. 

Her hand meets a hard surface. At the irregularity and roughness, she guesses it is stone. She follows the wall until it bends, an opening. She goes through the door and takes a left since she heard Andromeda’s scuffle lead to the right. There is a wall to the left and no exit, the right is the only way out. She follows the wall until she reaches a fork and has to make a decision. She can’t hear anything, no indicator of which way to go. She goes left.

She follows the wall for several minutes, often curving and turning but it keeps going.

Narcissa had said this place wouldn’t be found on any map and Andromeda further confirmed she is in danger for knowing of its existence. She wonders why its existence is such a secret. She supposes if they have power here they wouldn’t want to give that to an invading force. Perhaps they are responsible for the people here. She freezes at that.

If they are responsible for the people, they won’t take kindly to her running from their leaders. She needs to take her chances. She doesn’t trust leaving her fate in the hands of people who turn against her the moment she mentions something she overheard. That they had said in front of her in the first place. She needs to survive. If she is the one to live through the crash it is her duty to survive.

She hears the shuffling before the voice. “Look what we have here.” It is a new voice, one that is higher than the others. She knows immediately it is the third sister. “I told you your pet would make a run for it.” The woman taunts her sisters. She can hear the three separate breathing patterns, all breathing at different rates. 

When she starts turning around both Narcissa and Andromeda shouted at the same time, “Don’t!” Hermione stops halfway, fear freezing her in place. “Don’t look at us.” Andromeda practically pleads.

“You keep saying that, why?” Hermione asks, her voice less strong than she wished it could be. 

The sister she’s least interacted with let out a loud laugh at her question. “You were right Cissy! She is a brat. Not nearly scared enough.” At her words Hermione wonders if finding out why they are so terrified of being seen matters less then getting away from them. 

She does the stupidest most reckless thing she’s ever done in her life. She leaves the wall that they surround and runs in the opposite direction of the women. She shoots off as quick as she can make her body move. As soon as she starts sprinting away they follow just as quick. The low throbbing in her ribs turns into a barely tolerable debilitating pain. She pushes forward. She’s started this path she has to see it through. 

She tries reaching around to stop herself if necessary but she is running too fast when she meets an unexpected obstacle. She slams roughly into it, smacking her already wounded face into the rough object. She feels the wound reopen and blood to begins spilling down her face. She pulls back bringing her hand to the object. It is stone like the walls but it isn’t large enough to be a wall. She brings her hand over two protruding circles before grazing over the rather obvious protruding shape. It is a nose. Why do they have statues of people?

“Oh look, you found Lucius!” Comes a mad cackle from behind her. Not hesitating she takes off once more. Her pace is slower as it seems this room is stock full of statues. She has to blindly feel her way through them, weaving a path she hopes doesn’t have a dead end. The sisters scuffle behind her obviously having more familiarity with the statues and are easily gaining on her. As she starts losing hope they’d ever end, she is free. Although there is the occasional statue she doesn’t have to squeeze between them. The rough texture scrapes at her bare legs, she knows she’ll be raw if she makes it out of here. 

She tries to pick her speed back up now that she is she free of the maze but finds herself growing exhausted. She can’t keep up this chase. She is mid stride when she realizes there is no floor beneath her toes. She can’t stop her momentum from launching her over a perilous ledge with a drop of unknown height.

Just as the scream starts to build in her throat, she is pulled back from her possible death. 

An arm wraps around her waist, tight as iron with no indication of letting go. Her rescuer, or captor depending on how she thinks about it, is breathing heavily. Hermione can’t blame her because she is breathing just as hard. The exertion of the run and the fear of death leaves her breathless. Her ribs are absolutely screaming by now. She lets her body sag against the body behind her. She tries pushing back away from the ledge but the woman is unrelenting. 

She feels suspended in those moment. Nearly dead to not dead. A stranger breathing against her ear holding her steady. “Careful now, mortal. Can’t have your brains all across my floor.”


	3. Reveal

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the kind comments!

She didn’t expect that particular sister to save her. As it is, they’ve now saved her life twice. She starts turning around but feels the arm tighten further. 

“Don’t. Look.” Narcissa’s voice is sharp as glass.

“Why?” Hermione pants out.

“We were going to tell you that before you proved Bellatrix right and ran.” Andromeda mumbles clearly upset. 

A laugh huffs in her ear. “I’m always right.” Whether she is talking to Andromeda or her she can't tell. She is just hoping her heart won’t explode before they either kill her or spare her. She shouldn’t have tempted their mercy by running but she couldn’t trust people as suspicious as her hosts. Bellatrix loosens her grip but doesn’t remove it. Her hand goes from gripping onto to Hermione’s hip to ensure she didn’t fall or run, to splayed over her ribs. “You’d do best to remember that.” This time her intention is clear.

“Bellatrix will let you go if you don’t look.” Andromeda explains.

“Or run. Again.” Narcissa adds.

“Or that.”

“Will I?” Hermione can feel the hum that goes through the shorter woman’s body at that. It wasn’t the only thing she could feel. Something is wriggling through her hair, something very similar to her encounter with Andromeda earlier. Considering the one hand on her body she could have assumed it was Bellatrix’s other hand but she hasn’t gotten by this long without being adept at identifying objects. It isn’t her hand but she can’t make out what it was. 

Maybe she should have just gone over the ledge, she could have survived.

“Bella.” Andromeda’s voice is as tight as a wire.

“I’m just playing with the mortal Andy, don’t worry she won’t come to harm so long as she isn’t an idiot.” Hermione feels herself bristle at the prod.

“At least I didn’t let my prisoner make a run for it.” Hermione shoots back at Bellatrix.

“You’re not-” Andromeda tries to refute it but finds herself cut off by Bellatrix.

“Ooh, have a fire do you mortal? They always fold so easily. Heroes they call themselves, cowards all of them. Did you come here for my head? My sisters?”

“Why would I want your head? My friends and I just wanted to see what there was outside our homeland. Now they’re dead and I’m stuck here.”

“You didn’t know about this place?” Narcissa’s voice is guarded but curious. 

“Like you’ve said, not on a map. No one is supposed to know where it is. How would I have known? I don’t want trouble.” 

“I’m sure you don’t want trouble. They never do. Just an innocent bunch of misunderstood humans.” Bellatrix’s patronizing tone of voice makes Hermione want to stomp on her toes. She only just holds back.

“Why do you keep saying mortal? Human?” 

“That’s what you are.”

“And you’re not?” 

“Can’t you tell?” She can. Now that she mentions it, whatever is curling itself around in her hair is not a human appendage. 

“What are you?”

A dark laugh rings around the room. “The last thing you’ll ever see.”

“She won’t look.” Andromeda sounds uncertain. She’s trying to stand strong in the face of her two sister’s judgement but not quite managing.

“They always look. You should know that better than anyone.”

“Bellatrix.” Narcissa once again cuts it. Her voice harsher than Hermione has heard it yet. Even when it was directed at her earlier.

“I didn’t mean it.” She could practically feel the woman roll her eyes behind her.

“Yet, you always bring it up.” Andromeda voice sounds like it did earlier. The same tone that had made her flee her room. She isn’t sure any of these women are safe. It isn’t even their claimed inhuman status that has her unnerved but their volatile temperament. Andromeda goes from kind and tender to a burning cold. Narcissa seems determined to despise her despite saving her life. She didn’t have a good handle on Bellatrix yet but she didn’t seem any fonder of her then Narcissa. They radiated danger. 

“For Merlin’s sake.” Hermione twists her body around in her captor’s arms. Her hair gets caught and pulled slightly causing her to let out pained hiss.

A thin bony hand quickly covers her eyes, not quick enough judging by their gasps. She could smell the dirt on Bellatrix’s hands and the iron of the blood still dripping down her face. “How many times did they say not to look?” Her tone is both irritated and amused. 

“If you want me dead why do you keep saving me?”

“Have I said I want you dead?” 

“She does.” The sisters pipe up.

“You’re either a fool here to die or a hero here to die.”

“Is there another choice?”

“No.”

Narcissa mumbles something to herself, too quiet for Hermione to hear but by Andromeda’s hum she heard. “Perhaps we should question why the girl isn’t stone?”

“I covered her eyes.” 

“Not fast enough.” 

“It’s not my fault the mortal is desperate to die.”

“We’re not assigning blame. Just a fact, she shouldn’t still be breathing.” 

“Maybe we should assign blame.” Bellatrix’s crisp words shut Narcissa down.

Hermione is tired of the sisters constant bickering. “Uh, maybe we should get back to the prisoner?” Bellatrix’s hand moves from her eyes to her mouth. If it weren’t for the fear of the sister’s intentions, she’d bite the grimy hand covering her face. 

“You’re not a prisoner.” Andromeda is able to finish her declaration this time.

“Enough.” There is no question who is ultimately the final voice among the sisters. Who they look towards. Even from Hermione’s first experience with the two on the beach they’d been concerned over what Bellatrix would think. “Did you see them?” Her words are directed at Hermione, they command an answer. Hermione huffs through the fingers still covering her mouth, taking the hint she spread her fingers.

“I couldn’t if I wanted to.”

“Explain.” 

That wave of irritation that is always close to the surface batters against her lips. The vitriol that wants to be released on whoever dares address her blindness. They never say what they should. It is always pity or praise. Honeyed words or platitudes to the gods. Harry and Luna, were two outstanding exceptions. Perhaps that’s why she held them so close to her heart. “I’m. Blind.” Words have always been her greatest tool. Ones she’s sharpened into weapons that could cut and bleed. These sisters may choose to throw her off the ledge they dangle her over but she will not die easily. She will spit and bite and drag her heels. She will wield her words as the rest of the world abandons her.

“A perfect pet for you Andromeda. Incapable of killing herself unlike your last one.” The meaning while not clear the intention unmistakable. It seems Hermione isn’t the only one who knows how to carve her way with her words.

A cacophony of hisses explodes behind where she and Bellatrix stand. She knows it is where Narcissa and Andromeda stand but it isn't a human noise. It rings out in the room and bounces around the walls. It keeps ricocheting around the room long after the hissing had stopped. Cold trickles of fear scrape across her skin.

The hissing stops but Andromeda’s voice is just as fierce. “Watch yourself, sister.”

“I speak nothing but truth.” Bellatrix’s condescending tone grits against the other woman’s warning. Hermione wonders how she found herself stuck in family drama. Her life and future dangling at the mercy of a dysfunctional family. “Open your eyes, human.” Again, an order.

Self-preservation could only extends so far. “I may be human but I am no one’s pet.” She would rather die herself than someone they think they can laud themselves over. They, at least Andromeda and Narcissa, have been adamant about not wanting her dead. They will either prove themselves hypocrites or true to their word.

“Open. Your. Eyes.” So she does. It is the same darkness to her but the sisters gasp once more. Even Bellatrix’s grasp on her chin wavers. “She speaks truth.”

“I would lie about this?”

“Mortals are nothing but lies and betrayals.” 

“Immortals are better? If the gods have done half of what I’ve heard they are as much of monsters.” The hiss that erupts this time is much closer. She feels her body lock up more violently than last time, stressing her injuries but too afraid to uncoil. The hissing was in and around her face, completely surrounding her.

The hand tightens on her face before she takes it away entirely. “Listen here.” Bellatrix’s voice is positively shaking with rage and Hermione knows she desperately miscalculated. “We are nothing like the gods or goddesses of this land.” The way she spits out gods and goddess is so tainted by malevolence it sounds forbidden, like the words haven’t passed utterance in this land in a long time. “We are immortals. You are on Azkaban, The Island of Gorgons. Do you understand what I am saying to you?” Hermione knows she is expected to know exactly what this means. To know of their island, of what a gorgon was, of whatever their story may be. If it involves immortals and gods, she wouldn’t know it. She’s studiously avoided anything riddled with what she considers the stupidity of humans. They would call her blessed when she was so very cursed. She didn’t care to learn about her so called patron god anymore than she cared to learn about any others. 

She faced obstacles in her avoidance of the subject. So many scholars entertained the idea of gods and magic, impossibilities, that she would often come across it. She supposes now that she finds herself trapped with sisters who claim to be immortals, sisters who radiate inhumanity, she is the real fool.

“I don’t.”

“Don’t what?” 

“I don’t know what a gorgon or whatever this island is.” 

“Truly?” Narcissa is closer then she had been earlier, just behind where Bellatrix stands. A hand reaches out and grabs onto hers. If she were to guess, she would guess it is Bellatrix. The fingers are as thin and long as the ones covering her eyes earlier. “Bella.” A warning. It seems all these sisters can do is bicker and warn one another.

“It’ll be fine.” Bellatrix waves her concern off. “Feel like being brave mortal?” Hermione sets her jaw, meeting the challenge. She can hear Bellatrix’s laugh fill the space around them, it is a preferable sound to the hissing not too long ago. She raises their hands, higher and higher until she is near the woman’s head. She understands immediately what the woman is showing her. “There it is. Hesitation.” It is a satisfied observation, one that aggravated Hermione. “If you hurt them you go over the cliff faster than you can beg.” She can’t say she wasn’t warned.

Bellatrix’s hand slides down from her hands to her wrists, urging her on but not blocking her movements. It isn’t hair although she suspected that much. It isn’t skin either. It takes her an embarrassingly long moment to identify what exactly she is feeling, especially when she’s relied on her sense of touch for so long. The hissing makes a lot more sense when one of the snake wraps itself around their wrists. “Oh.” 

“Don’t pass out.” Andromeda supplies. 

“They won’t bite?” 

“If you don’t try anything.” Narcissa informs her. Hermione’s fear slowly leaks away the longer she touches the snakes and none of them bite her. She wonders how many there were, she can tell there are quite a few. They have different textures, some are warmer and some are cooler, some are more firm while others are more fragile. Some would wrap themselves around her or Bellatrix’s arm, some would just brush by her. After initial contact most left her alone, the one wrapped around them seems to be the most tactile. It seems like they are testing her, greeting her, possibly as curious about her as she is them.

“You have snakes. As hair.” 

“Still with us?” Narcissa’s hand lands on her shoulder, meant to comfort. It’s a surprising gesture from the woman.

“Snakes. Okay, yes, I’m still with you.” Hermione nods decisively a few times. There is a beat of silence. She can guess that they are trying to regain their footing. It likely isn’t how they’d expected this to go, it sure isn’t how she expected it to go. “What now?”

The response is slow coming and when it does come it is from Narcissa. “We decide how to move forward.” 

Bellatrix extricates their hands from the snakes before tugging on her wrist, away from the ledge and the sisters. “I think the mortal and I shall have a chat.” Neither sister protests. Hopefully Bellatrix has had enough warnings about not killing her to put that particular desire to rest.

“Hermione.”

“Hm?”

“Hermione, that’s my name.”

“I’ll hardly need to know your name, save the pleasantries for my bleeding heart sisters.”

“Then could you at least not drag me along? I already told you I am no one’s pet or slave.”

“You can’t see. Do you want to go smashing into more statues or falling off cliffs?”

“Then do me the courtesy of leading me without dragging me or better yet I can follow the sound of your footsteps.”

“You can hear that well?”

“One of the advantages, if you want to call it that.”

She is surprised when the woman actually heeds her words. She’d thought the stubborn woman would simply drag her along after all but she slows her pace and loosens her grip. She moves her grip from Hermione’s upper arm to her hand, a guiding movement instead of a forceful gesture. She doesn’t relinquish her hold of Hermione, not entirely. Hermione doubts she wants to give up total control over a situation she is clearly still uncertain over. She allows Bellatrix this with no more argument, aware that some modicum of peace must be maintained for whatever talk lay ahead.

Hermione is very good at being able to retrace her steps. She can count and follow in the direction she came from, she could note lefts and rights with ease, whatever path Bellatrix took her on completely boggled her. It is innumerable lefts and rights, inclines and declines, at one point a spiral incline. Finally, they break from the stale unmoving air into a slight breeze and open air. Bellatrix walks a little more ways forward before stopping. “Careful, there’s a cliff beyond us.”

“In case you need to throw me over?” 

“There are many ways to kill you, mortal.” It isn’t exactly a no and Hermione is aware of that.

“What is it you needed to speak of away from your sisters?”

“You’re a curious creature. The only person in centuries who could freely live among us. Even Draco and Nymphadora aren’t so inclined.” A purposeful deliberation. “Which is why you are possibly the greatest threat to us since Lucius.” 

“The statue?”

“The man, now statue. Coincidentally Narcissa’s late husband. A story for another time.” Bellatrix moves, shifting towards her. “My concern is of the present.” 

“Then address it so we may move away from ledges and thinly veiled threats.”

“So much wild bravery.” It is nearly a coo with which she says this. “People have been coming to this island longer than you’ve been alive. Two questions always arise. Are they safe from us, and, are we safe from them.” 

“You want to know if you’re safe from me?”

“I know I could easily end your life but Cissy and Andy are already attached to you. The idea of a mortal who could live amongst us? It’s enthralling. They’ll be trying to marry you off to their spawn in no time.” 

“You do not wish to kill me?”

“I wish I had agreed to go with them looking for survivors. I wish I had found you so I could have returned you to the sea.”

“That’s reassuring.”

“Unfortunately, I did not. Now I must deal with you.”

Bellatrix’s callous nature of talking about her life and death is wearing on Hermione. “I won’t try and kill you or your sisters.”

“You believe this, yes. What if I were to tell you that the reason your ship is destroyed and the bay is filled with your friends corpses is because of my sisters?” Of course it is. It has been tickling in the back of Hermione’s mind the entire time. Those voices that are so startlingly familiar. Familiar because they are the voices that crooned to them, beckoned them closer. Luring them into the storm that would shatter their hull against the rocks. Killing everyone except Hermione. Now that it is spoken the truth could not hide. She couldn’t unhear it, unsee it. 

She feels such a rage at the announcement, just as the woman had hoped to stir within her. It is a violent urging, a push to do harm. She wants them to hurt, to feel the pain her friends had felt as they died. To feel the pain that’s harvesting her body for its own.

She can’t hurt them. Not yet. She can’t break their bodies nor shed their blood in recompense. No, her survival is intrinsically tied to theirs. Her life depends on their guilt, if it is even genuine. Their desire to make right what can never be made right. Moreover, she has no doubt Bellatrix would butcher her if she tries anything against her sisters. Although they seemed dysfunctional during their discussion, she has no doubt Bellatrix cares for her sisters. 

Instead, she grits her teeth and braces her soul for a field of lies. Fields of roses and lilies to cloud the stench of rot. A rot that touches the depths of Hermione’s soul and begs to be set free upon them. To spread until all there is, is that rot. 

“What if I were to tell you I already know?” She begins her first lie of many. She hadn’t known, not really. They were loose threads waiting to be connected but not fully formed.

“You won’t kill them?”

“By my account, they saved me. So did you.”

“I’m not a fan of red on my rocks.”

“What now?”

“Now? Now we figure out how to coexist.”


	4. Resolve

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just gonna pretend it hasn't been months.  
> Thank you for all the comments!  
> I went back and somewhat edited previous chapters as well.

Coexisting, as it turns out, is much harder than Hermione had predicted. She spends her days much like she spent her childhood, learning how to navigate the world she found herself in. She is able to learn the island quicker than she was able to learn the area around her village. The cave system the sisters brought her to is the first place she learns. The turns and divots are easy to remember. She stays in the room she first woke up in. 

Outside is a bit more difficult to learn. For starters, she doesn’t want to be eaten by wolves. Despite Andromeda’s assurances she still wasn’t at ease with the wilds. 

“No animals on this island will harm you.” Andromeda seems sure but her faith in the woman is nonexistent. The rage that burbles in her gut everytime one of the two sisters nears her is toxic. It’s out of her control. She bites down on it, shoves it so far down there’s no way they’ll see. She needs them pliable, needs them noncombatant. If she proves a danger, if she shows her anger, she has no doubt she will face Bellatrix’s wrath. That speaks nothing to the dangers the other two sisters offer. They saved her yet they killed everyone else. Their presence causes no end of suffering for Hermione and so, she avoids them. 

This requires her to leave the cave system. 

She learns the paths and trees through a process of memorization. Land markers are abundant and she takes advantage. Andromeda proves true when she stumbles across a boar. She hears the distinct sounds only inches from her but it does not attack. It passes her by with no interest. When her nerve returns, she continues on with mapping the terrain. It’s not long until she meets the previously mentioned spawn.

She’s on a beach near the caves when she first meets them.

Beaches are harder to learn. The sand and anything familiar is washed away by the tide. She leans on counting steps and remembering the direction she comes from. She’s standing in the tide, ruminating on the shipwreck, when she hears two sets of footsteps. She feels her shoulders bunch at the presence of the sisters and forces them to relax.

“So you’re the girl mom is going on about.” An unfamiliar voice calls. It’s feminine, different than the sisters but accented. Hermione ventures she is Nymphadora, who Bellatrix had mentioned by name. 

“Unless you have anyone else wandering around the island.”

“No, definitely not.” A masculine voice this time, Draco.

“So, what is it you want?”

Nymphadora comes to stand next to her. “Must we want something?” 

“Why else would you be here?”

“To say hi?”

Draco decides to cut in, although he stays where he is. “We’re curious.”

“About what exactly?”

“Everything.” Draco’s attempting nonchalance but he is doing a terrible job at it.

“We don’t get a lot of visitors. At least not ones that aren’t trying to kill our moms.” Nymphadora adds wistfully. 

“It’s just us and our mothers.” Draco sounds more bitter than Nymphadora.  
“And Aunt Bella.” 

“Ah yes, how could I forget her.” Draco’s responds to her. 

“Not a fan of your family?” Hermione asks.

“He loves us, it just gets a bit…”

“Suffocating?” Draco offers.

“Yeah.” Nymphadora’s reply is awkward. She obviously isn’t so blase on complaining about her situation as Draco is. “It’s just a bit lonely only having a few people to talk to.”

“Which is why you’re here.” Hermione clarifies. 

“To be honest, you’re the most interesting thing to happen in decades.”

“You’ll forgive me if the deaths of all my friends isn’t as interesting to me.” She hears Draco choke at her words, quick to rescind his own.

“I didn’t mean interesting as if to demean what you’ve lost. It’s just been a long time since we’ve talked to anyone new.”

“He doesn’t know how to talk to us so it’s no wonder he can’t talk to you.” It’s a rib to disarm the conversation but Hermione indulges. It’s best if she can talk to someone who isn’t Andromeda or Narcissa, even if it’s their children.

“How long have you been here?” 

“We’ve always been here. We were both born here.” Nymphadora tells her.

“Are you guys like your moms?”

“Gorgons?”

“Yes.”

“Not quite.” Draco finally joins the two of them.

“We have extended life according to our moms but we don’t have the physical characteristics. We also don’t turn anyone into stone.” Nymphadora explains. 

“Oh.” 

“I’m Draco, by the way. Draco Black.” It’s so formal Hermione has to laugh a little, it’s overshadowed by Nymphadora’s laughs.

“Hermione Granger.”

“Nymphadora Tonks. Tonks if you please.” Apparently she doesn’t go by what Bellatrix called her. Hermione wonders what the story is behind that but leaves it alone.

“So, want to find some of the best parts of the island?” Draco offers. She could use someone experienced with the island and accepts.

From then on, the two find her more often than not. Sometimes they’re together and other times they’re not. She wonders if they plan it, it seems like something they’d do. She finds she gets along with them easily enough. They’re both as intrigued as they had led on during the first meeting. They ask questions about what it’s like outside the island. They ask about the people, the places, the food. They ask every question that comes to their mind. In turn, they answer her questions within limits. They are reticent to answer anything about their moms or Bellatrix but will answer anything about themselves or the island. 

They both reflect their respective mother. Draco is more restrained, he thinks before responding, he can be cold at times but it comes across as more of an awkwardness and desire to protect his family, much like his mother. He’s more forthcoming than his mother. He’s willing to talk to her, he seems to enjoy their conversations even. Overall, he’s reserved but not unwilling to open up to her. Tonks is like his counterpart. She’s open, brash, and usually says the first thing that comes to her mind. She plows forward in conversations without fear of mistepping. She has a sharp sense of humor and the wit to match. Draco has his own sense of humor but it’s more subtle than Tonks’. 

With and without them she’s mapped nearly the entire island. It’s not an overly large island and it isn’t too much work. There’s the cave system where she still resides, the beaches, the forests on the island cover most of the terrain. Draco and Tonks took it upon themselves to show her the more dangerous places. They also showed her some places she might have had difficulty finding. They explained the island is surrounded by rocks making it difficult to safely navigate. She finds rivers and lakes throughout the island as well but she doesn’t explore their depths. She thought she explored it all until she takes a wrong turn in the caves and her fingers find a new path. She follows it into a new room, or cavern. She traces along the wall and finds it’s a closed circular room with only the one entrance. She explores the contents of the cave and comes across a drop. She sits on the edge, dipping her toes low to see how deep the drop is. She’s surprised to meet wetness. Her feet drop into what she believes is water. It’s warm, warmer than most water she’s ever been in. She leans back and wiggles her feet back and forth.

“Enjoying yourself?” Hermione jolts with surprise at the voice. She hadn’t heard anyone enter. 

“Bellatrix?” Her heart is racing with surprise, she thought she was alone. 

“The one and the only.”

“Can you not sneak up on me?”

“You’re in my quarters mortal, I believe the offense is yours.”

“I’ve been here for weeks!” It really has been weeks by now, three by her count. Three weeks of learning her terrain and avoiding the sisters. She’s been doing excellently at that until now.

“I mean you’re in my quarters, right now.” Her blood freezes at that. Intruding on the sister most likely to kill isn’t exactly in her plan.

“I’m sorry, I’ll leave.” An annoyed noise meets her words.

“So quick to run away?” 

“I’m leaving your room, not running for my life. It’s just decency.”

“Is it? I’m quite sure you’re running but go ahead and believe what you want.” Hermione could feel her irritation surge. Even when she’s trying to be pleasant, Bellatrix is antagonizing.

“Then I’ll stay.” She sits back down, feet returning to the water. Silence builds between the two before she hears Bellatrix shift. A page turns, her attention no longer on Hermione. Bellatrix is the most antagonizing of the sisters but she’s also the one she’s most comfortable near. For starters, she had nothing to do with the wreck of the Deathly Hallows. Bellatrix is also plain with her. She doesn’t like her, she wants her gone, she would likely kill her if she felt she could get away with it. Hermione doesn’t have to wonder over her intentions, not like the other two sisters. She doesn’t mind sitting in awkward silence with Bellatrix simply because she’s not the other two. 

She sinks further into the water, it wades to her calves now. She’s been borrowing Draco’s trousers, which are rolled up to avoid getting wet. He was surprisingly accommodating. The sisters prefer skirts and dresses, which Hermione despises. Draco muttered about not wanting to wear dresses either and shared his trousers with her. It was the first thing that really substantiated their budding friendship. She still isn’t entirely comfortable with Tonks and Draco, she still worries they’re agents for their mothers, but she’s slowly easing around them. 

She grows at ease in the room, silent except the turn of the occasional page and their joined breathing. The water is soothing, it’s slowly lulling her to sleep. She wonders how it’s so warm. The closest thing she’s experienced is the rare bath back at her village. “If you fall asleep, I won’t be held accountable.”

“What would you do?”

“Something hideous, I’m sure.” 

“How terrifying.” There’s a small sound as Bellatrix puts her own feet in the water. “What are you reading?”

“A book.” She is half tempted to shove the woman in the water. “It’s about how to exterminate the human plague.”

“How cute, does it have a step by step guide or is it general theories?” 

“What makes you think it’s not practical?”

“I don’t see how it could be.”

“Experience is everything.” The next page turns obnoxiously loud. 

“You’re unbearable.” 

“We agree on something. My family is inordinately obsessed with you.” 

“Jealous?”

“Anything that distracts Andy from me is just fine.”

“You think I’m fine? I’m flattered.” She shouldn’t prod Bellatrix as much as she has been but she apparently has little sense of self-preservation. That and she knows Bellatrix is amused by the conversation so far, which is fine. If Hermione crosses a line into hostile territory she will scurry right back. 

“I will end you if you continue to test me.”

“Have I been testing you?”

“Vexing, more like.”

“My sincerest apologies. I will take my leave.” She takes her feet from the water, standing and stretching her back. She’s been here longer than she thought.

“Finally.” 

She takes the path back to her room and tosses herself into her bed. Tired from a day of wandering and then her experience with Bellatrix. It’s a long few weeks. She’s hiked so many miles her feet throb, another reason she stayed so long in the water. The heat relieved some of the throbbing. She can say she knows the island well enough now. 

Avoiding the sisters has been a chore of its own. Moreover, making it seem like she isn’t avoiding them. It is an act of tight politeness masking her real emotions. The sadness that wells up whenever she stops moving, stops planning. The rage that rests just below her skin now. She was able to let it slip from her mind earlier with Bellatrix but here, in her bed, it’s back. It’s eating her alive. She needs to leave the island. She needs to leave and tell people back home what happened. She need to inform the families of the dead. She needs to leave before she does something she’ll regret.


	5. Acclimation

Leaving the island is harder than she hoped it would be. She has no means to escape. The Deathly Hallows is destroyed and in all her exploring she hasn’t come across a dock or boathouse. She doesn’t dare ask her hosts. The peace is being kept, she isn’t foolish enough to threaten it. This leaves her in a bit of a dead end. She needs a ship to leave but as far as she knows, there isn’t one. She could ask but she seriously doubts it would be taken well. 

Beyond attempting to keep the peace by not insulting her hosts, she knows they desire to keep her here. Their hesitation when they first found her was the first indicator. Andromeda had assured Hermione she wouldn’t kill her but regarded her situation as complicated. Complicated it is. 

They are extremely paranoid. They have been since the beginning. The way they interrogated her over her intentions, how she knew the islands location. They don’t want her to tell others, she is almost certain of this. Her silence is guaranteed by remaining here. However, staying here simply is not an option for Hermione. 

Their reasons make sense even if Hermione does not wish to follow them. It’s logical, the best way to keep a secret is to physically keep it with you. Secret it away onto a far off island. This isn’t the only reason, although it is perhaps the reason they most wish her to believe. They’re desperate for human interaction. They’ve all said it one way or another, some more plain than others.

Draco and Tonks make no show of reaching out to her. They’ve complained about the limited socialization they enjoy. Draco had told her it was just nice to talk to someone who wasn’t family and although Tonks scowled, she agreed. She knows it is also this way with Andromeda who seeks her out the most of the sisters. She wants someone to talk to, someone who isn’t a child she raised or a sister she’s lived with for years. She isn’t sure how old the sisters are, she’s sure they are old, older than any human could ever dream of. Tonks had told Hermione that she was in her hundreds, she fears how ancient the sisters are. She knows Andromeda is also the most outgoing of the sisters but no matter how hard she tries to relax, she can’t. Narcissa, although less obvious in her attempts, has sought Hermione out as well. She does her best to dissuade the sisters but they are persistent. 

Then there’s Bellatrix.

Bellatrix is more complicated than she thought she would be. Hermione has returned to Bellatrix’s quarters three times since her accidental discovery. Bellatrix always allows her in. Much of the time they spend in silence but not all of it. It’s usually more taunts tossed between them but it lacks the bite she was expecting. For all her talk and bluster, Hermione was starting to wonder if Bellatrix had an issue with her presence or if it’s just a show. An act well versed. The more time she spends with Bellatrix the more comfortable she becomes around her. She’s also noticed neither Andromeda nor Narcissa will enter Bellatrix’s quarters. It’s safe. That statement alone should shock Hermione, safe with the woman who’d carelessly discussed her death as if it were the weather. Yet it didn’t change the fact she found solace in that cave. With her feet dipped in warm water and the sound of pages turning, she felt her racing thoughts slow. It is really the only times they slow down enough to not be maddening.   
She’s on her way to Bellatrix’s quarters, in an attempt to stop thinking of the impossibility of an escape, when she encounters Narcissa.

“Hermione.” A greeting. She’s surprised, Hermione can hear as much, but pleased. She thinks Narcissa is the one catching onto her avoidance the quickest. She plays games with her words, leading Hermione in mazes. Where she goads Bellatrix, she engages Narcissa in a battle of words she isn’t sure she entirely understands.

“Narcissa.” She leaves the surprise out of her voice, not giving Narcissa that inch.

“Where are you heading so quickly?” It’s a trick question. She knows where she’s heading. Other than dead ends and long paths, Bellatrix's quarters are the only thing in this section of the cave. They both know this. 

“I’m just strolling.” A lie, a blatant lie. She can hear the cluck Narcissa’s refraining from making, too used to admonishing Draco and Tonks. She doesn’t call Hermione on her lie, that’s not their battle. She’ll usher Hermione about how she sees fit with the subtlety of a noble much unlike her sisters who are often direct. 

“Well, if you’re not doing anything important you should see Draco. He asked about you earlier.” A challenge. Admit to going to Bellatrix’s and she can go about her day. If she keeps her stand she’ll spend the next few hours doing as Narcissa says. Luckily, she enjoys Draco’s presence enough to spite his mother. She’d prefer the pond and peace of the cave but she’s willing to bend to annoy Narcissa.

“Of course, where is he?” 

“Where else? The river.” Although Narcissa is adept at the battle of wills she employs with Hermione, even better than herself she can admit, she is plain when speaking about her son. Exasperation colors her tone when she speaks of the river she detests. It’s a dangerous river full of rapids, it is one of the locations Tonks and Draco had warned her of. It irks Narcissa to no ends Draco frequents it. Although he is a grown man of hundreds of years, Narcissa often acts as if he is still a child. That irks Draco to no ends. It’s a cycle of him going there to annoy her and her annoying him by continuing to treat him as a child. 

“I’ll go there, have a good afternoon.” She says her farewell and turns in the direction of the river. 

“You as well.”

The rapids are loud. She would have known they were here even if Tonks and Draco hadn’t warned her. Draco had built a hut near the river that he usually spends his time in. If she needs to seek him out she checks here first. He rarely stays in his room. Both Tonks and Draco reside outside of the caves. Tonks explained it was because they are not immune to their mother’s ability. If they are to see their mothers they would turn to stone. They’ve taken precautions. She’s sure there are even more she isn’t aware of. They wear blindfolds when in the presence of their mothers and reside outside the caves so they can live without having to wear the blindfolds. They do not enter the caves without blindfolds. The sisters almost never leave the caves, each to their varying degree. Andromeda goes to the beaches but she is sure to warn Tonks and Draco if she is going to. Narcissa is more likely to go to rivers, the calm ones that is. She too warns Tonks and Draco if she’s planning to do so. Bellatrix never leaves the caves. 

“Hermione!” He’s excited, more excited than usual. His reserved manner can take a while to melt away every time they interact but it's never been gone when she’s first started a conversation.

“Draco, your mother told me you wanted to see me.”

“We do.” Tonks scoffs walking up to her, after asking permission she tosses an arm around Hermione’s shoulders. “We have a surprise.”

“I came up with the idea.” Draco mumbles.

“I dug through the muddy water.” Tonks answers.

“Team effort it seems.” Hermione tries to break up what would likely turn into a competition.

“So, we found some stuff from the Deathly Hallows.” Tonks declares.

“Gods, a little tact?” Draco’s voice drips judgement but he isn’t wrong. She can feel her throat close up at the mention of the ship. Draco brings a chair over and sits her down in it. Tonks, the more tactile of the two, rubs her back. A comfort tactic likely absorbed from her mother. 

“Sorry.”

“You didn’t mean any harm.” Hermione reassures Tonks. She’s grateful for their attempts to ease her burden, likely having spent hours searching for something to give her. 

“We didn’t find much but we brought back everything we did.” There is a lot of clothes. She can’t identify most, they describe them but she guesses they were sailors she didn’t know. Only one article of clothing is familiar, it’s Harry’s jacket. It’s a punch to the stomach. She breathes in and out, refusing to cry. Her eyes still burn despite her best efforts. Tonks and Draco let her be, let her mourn. The jacket is dry, a bit crispy from the sea water but intact. She puts it on. It is oversized, it goes down to her knees and she had to roll up the sleeves. It was always large on Harry as his father was a bigger man. Harry always wore it anyways. She didn’t understand then, why he’d wear the jacket of his dead father, but now with a piece of Harry wrapped around her, she understands. The rest is junk more or less. Bobbles she has no connection to, nothing belonging to her friends. Junk she will keep with her until the day she dies. 

Then she finds her casts.

She drags Tonks and Draco into bruising hugs. She hears Draco groan, unfamiliar with her hugs let alone the strength of one of her fiercests. “Thank you, both of you.” 

They don’t ask about the jacket, she doubts they need to. “What are these?” Tonks asks.

“Casts, I pour wax into them onto parchment to write. It’s the best method Luna, Ginny, and I came up with.”

“It doesn’t burn through the paper?” Draco’s questions intrigued.

“Thick parchment and light pours of wax.”

“We have both, if you want it.” Tonks offers. Hermione hugs them even tighter.

“She’s going to kill us.” Draco groans.

“I would love any parchment and wax you can spare.” 

“What’s ours is yours, no sparing needed.” Tonks pats her before wandering away and rummaging through something. “Here, a few sheet and some wax. We can organize some more.”

“Thank you. I wanted to be a scholar.”

“Truly?”

“I was planning on writing about the journey, to legitimize myself.”

“You want to be a scholar and you knew nothing of Medusa or her gorgon sisters?” Draco’s sounds incredulous. A smacking sound and a yelp follows.

“Don’t call her that! You know she hates it.” 

“She still refuses to call you Tonks so what’s it matter?”

“Be the bigger person, Draco.”

“Never.”

“I don’t know why I try.” 

“Makes sense, why you’ve spent so much time with Aunt Bellatrix then.” The way he uses a formal title makes her think he’s conceding to Tonks, even if he has too much pride to outright do so.

“I’ve barely spent time with her.”

“Anytime with her is a lot of time with her.” Another smack. “You know I’m right Tonks.”

“Don’t have to say it.”

“She’s a grouchy cave dweller and we all know it.” 

“Why does it makes sense that I’d spend time with her? Theoretically.”

“She can deny it all she wants but she’s the most scholarly of the three.”

“Even your mother?” Hermione has a hard time believing someone who makes every conversation a riddle isn’t a scholar. 

“My mother is a healer, a respected and well read profession to be sure, but not a scholar.”

“Andromeda.”

“My mom was a soldier if you’ll believe it.”

“I don’t.” The thought of Andromeda as a soldier seems preposterous. Then she remembers how she flicked a switch and terrified Hermione. She remembers the bay full of corpses and thinks, maybe she can believe it. 

“Bellatrix was a scholar?” Uncomfortable shifts, Tonks clears her throat. She’s likely giving Draco a look right about now.

“Of sorts. Anyways, do you want any help taking this to your quarters?” Tonks offers a quick change of subject.

“That’d be appreciated.”

They tighten their blindfold, grab their portion of the junk, and head to the caves. They don’t run into anyone on their way there. Tonks and Draco help her sort the objects onto shelves and leave her. After hours of diversion, she sets back to Bellatrix’s lair.

She doesn’t run into either sister this time as well.

“I was wondering when you would show up.” It’s said with derision that Hermione is starting to see through. They were all lonely, all interested in contact that isn’t one another, even Bellatrix.

“Nice to see you too.” She walks to where she found the ground declined into the water rather than dropped off. She laid out on the slope allowing the water to gather up to her ankles and up the back of her calf. The effect was instantaneous. Worries of escaping, thoughts of Andromeda and Narcissa, and the constant sadness are pushed back for a few moments. 

“What are you wearing?”

“A friend’s jacket.” The dead part is heard.

“How dreary.” Hermione tenses as she’s about to yell at the woman. “I only meant it isn’t exactly healthy to wear the dead around your shoulders, mortal.” It’s placating, an attempt to disarm her. Hermione just breathes out the shouts. She drags out her casts, the wax, and the parchment she was given. She set the wax and parchment away from the water and starts checking the integrity of her casts. “What are those?” Bellatrix is more talkative today than usual.

“Casts, I pour wax into them to write.” 

“You write?”

“And read.” Bellatrix closes her book with a snap, the first time she’s done such. She always uses it as a barrier, even if she’s actively talking to Hermione. It seems Draco was right, books really are the way to Bellatrix.

“What shall you write?” Bellatrix is moving closer now, sitting next to her. Close enough Hermione can feel the warmth of her body.

“I’m not sure.”

“What have you written?”

“School work mostly. I’ve written on some history, my opinions on it. I planned to write on the journey.”

“Ah. What shall you write I wonder. Island of Gorgons, an existence surrounded by terrifying monsters.” Like with Narcissa, her words are a challenge. They’re a trap. Unlike with Narcissa, there’s little tact. Her words are carefully painted with anger and challenge to distract from the contents. The self-loathing that fills them.

“I don’t think you’re monsters.” She takes the bait.

“No, not even with the stone graveyard you have to maneuver?”

“Just because you killed them doesn’t mean you wanted to.”

“I did. Don’t doubt that.”

“When we met, you all spoke of those who come here to kill you. That was their intention was it not? Even if you wanted to kill them, you are not a monster. Why shouldn’t you want to kill people who invade your home to murder you and your family?”

Silence. She can practically hear the gears in Bellatrix’s mind turning. “Your friends didn’t come here to kill us yet they’re still dead.” Words meant to cut and cut they do. She feels as if Bellatrix flayed her to the bone with but one sentence. She means to test her, means to ignite that raging fire of anger she knows exists despite how well Hermione hides it. It’s an opportunity for Hermione, one she takes advantage of despite the knives being driven into her heart.

“They didn’t mean to, did they?” It’s something she’s wondered. She can’t see either of them intentionally luring a ship to its death. They’re lonely but not homicidal, at least usually. 

“No.” A grudging admittance, not wanting to lose her ground in the argument. What she hopes to win in this particular one, Hermione isn’t sure. 

“Then they can hardly be monsters.”

“They regret it.” Bellatrix is trying to speak up for her sisters, defend it, but Hermione can’t hear it. It breaks the safety of this particular cave, its brings back the stress she’s desperate to escape.

“Do you?”

“I didn’t have a part in it.” 

“I mean with the others, do you regret any of them?” Bellatrix’s hands waiver. She can hear them twitch against her skirts as if searching a page to idly play with. She doesn’t know why but she reaches out. Her hands skims against Bellatrix’s outer thigh until she finds her hand. Hermione carefully, slowly, takes it. She gives Bellatrix enough time to pull away but it seems the other woman is frozen. She can hear the woman’s snakes moving quicker than usual but she isn’t versed enough to interpret what that means. She can usually hear the slick of their skin in near constant motion but it is louder, more pronounced. Bellatrix doesn’t pull away, she turns her wrist, taking Hermione’s hand loosely. She can still feel the tenseness of Bellatrix’s frame, the way she hasn’t breathed since Hermione reached over. 

She feels the urge to rescind her question but Bellatrix hadn’t retracted nor apologized over her words. If they’re to trade brutalities then so be it. Hermione will now cow beneath the other woman but she can not allow her to dangle as Bellatrix had allowed her. Hermione will meet her head on in their discussion but she won’t sacrifice who she is, she won’t be cruel where there is no need for cruelty. She wonders if the contact helps, if it offers any comfort. She will pull back if it is unwanted, if it only makes Bellatrix more uncomfortable, but eventually Bellatrix relaxes. Her fingers wrap around Hermione’s. They’re gritty, undoubtedly covered in dirt like she’d smelled weeks before, but they fit. They’re warm, warmer than the water even.

“Oh human, I regret much.”

Later, when the wax is hot and she is once more alone, she writes. She writes of the storm and the wreck, but she does not write of the sisters inhumanity. She does not write about monsters.


	6. Avoidance

Bellatrix becomes a ghost. Hermione doesn’t see her for days. She isn’t subtle in her avoidance but Hermione doesn’t have much room to judge as she’s still avoiding the sisters. She isn’t sure how she does it. Bellatrix never leaves the caves and is almost always in her own quarters. Yet, she’s mysteriously gone whenever Hermione goes there. Bellatrix is never around the parts of the cave she is in. She never could have guessed how much she finds herself missing the other woman. 

She hadn’t intended to become attached to the family. She’s going to leave the island and the killers of her friends but slowly she finds herself endeared to the odd family. Particularly Bellatrix, the woman who had been the most likely to toss her off a cliff. Draco and Tonks both have become friends. She can’t deny it. She fills her days with them between failed plans and ideas to escape. Their witty banter and kindness makes for easy company. She finds she appreciates the both of them for different reasons. Draco knows she’s perturbed about Bellatrix avoiding her but doesn’t say anything about it. Tonks is pre-occupied by trying to get Hermione to talk about all her interests that she doesn’t ask about the present. She’s learning Hermione’s past to better know her while Draco doesn’t much care for the past, hers at least. 

She’s in Bellatrix’s quarters, silent other than her breathing. She knows Bellatrix is likely avoiding her because of their discussion but it starts to irritate her. She should give the woman time to figure out whatever it is she needs but her avoidance is juvenile. She hadn’t murdered her friends, she should be able to move on from whatever she said. She could at least tell Hermione if she said something to offend her. No, that’s not how the woman works. She’s tired of this, she’s the closest connection she has on this island and she won’t even talk to her. She misses the irritating woman’s barbs. 

She gets up and heads through the caves. A systematic search was in order. She is going to find Bellatrix and force her to get over whatever hiccup there had been. Considering Bellatrix was the one to toss her friends in her face so casually Hermione should be the one avoiding her. Curse Bellatrix for making her be the one to bridge this difference. 

“You look like you’re on a warpath.” She hasn’t heard Andromeda around in a while either. She doesn’t mind the woman’s absence as she minds Bellatrix’s but the lack of contact has been unsettling. It is a break in her pattern of behavior. 

“I suppose I am.”

“I’ll leave you to it.” Footsteps shuffle down the hallway, stopping beside her. “You might think to try the courtyard.” She continues on. 

The courtyard, where she’d nearly run off a cliff. She avoids it usually. Too many statues and cliffs, not entirely safe for her. Of course Bellatrix would be hiding there.

She hears singing when she rounds a corner, closing in on the courtyard. No, not singing. Not like it had been before. Narcissa and Andromeda’s singing beared down on a person as if their will was now theirs. It’s humming, words left unformed but the empty space filled with rhythm. Almost a song, almost a shipwreck, but not quite. It’s a melody. Soft, softer than she thought to expect from Bellatrix. Perhaps she should stop believing she knows the people she finds herself with. A person can be many things and she keeps trying to pin them down, assign them with their identity. 

She knows what it’s like to have people think they know you. Ron, who was so ready to believe they belonged to one another. Her teachers who were split between thinking her a sycophant and a simpleton, either she was too smart or not smart enough. Even her parents couldn’t stop seeing her as their little girl, so attached they were to this idea even when she left they talked to Harry about her well-being more than to her. She likes to think she is many things and she must break the habit of trying to assume who the family is. Who Bellatrix is.

“That’s quite pretty.” She hadn’t meant it to sounds so derisive but her irritation at being avoided slipped out. Considering the nature of most of their conversations, perhaps it’s better to start with this.

“Do you still expect me to be anything but perfect?” 

“Perfect doesn’t always mean pretty.”

“You don’t think I’m pretty?” She can hear the pout as she weaves her way through the stone, carefully not scraping against it this time. 

“You’ve been described to me as a cave dweller.”

“Cave dwellers can be pretty.”

“Cave dwellers can also be quite difficult to find.” She shuffles as Hermione makes it through the stone, standing somewhere near the woman. 

“Perhaps there is a reason for that.” 

“Why’re you avoiding me?” 

“Who says I’m avoiding you?” She resists the urge to tell Bellatrix she just had moments before but lets it go. 

“If you’re not avoiding me then next time I’m in your quarters will you be there?”

“How am I to know where I’ll be? I’m not the oracle here.” Hermione almost slaps her. The comment so wildly insensitive, one she must know would offend Hermione. Like last time she’s trying to attack with her words. She will not have it this time. They had battled and settled last time. Cutting words and soothing confessions, hands entangled. Bellatrix has hid because of it. So no, that’s not how this encounter will go. She turns to leave. Perhaps she’ll return when Bellatrix is less surly and she is less angry. “Wait. It’s...I’m, look just sit?” An apology, poorly stated but an apology. She sits. 

“We can’t make it a thing.” They can trade barbs and taunts but there is a difference, there is a line. It must be drawn and their feet must stick before it, never crossing. 

“It won’t be the last time I offend you.” Honesty, she’s seen and heard the way she talks to her sisters. She loves them dearly, more than Hermione likely can know, but she can say words so harsh the air cracks with tension. Bellatrix isn’t entirely soft or entirely hard. She’s wire and feather weaved in delicate balance. Even her softness has the harsh spine of a feather. Hermione knows she could spend a lifetime listening and talking to Bellatrix and never fully understand her. 

“At least try not to and I shall do the same. Perhaps you can tell me whatever I did that makes you avoid me.” She’s trying to control the conversation, bring it back to its roots. She can’t let them wander off and forget the reason she came here. A reason important enough to cause Bellatrix to avoid her for days.

“It’s nothing, let’s move on.” Bellatrix doesn’t want to talk about whatever it was. She is eager to move on but Hermione can’t. She opens her mouth to protest, to assert the importance of the discussion when Bellatrix cuts her off. “Just stop. You’re unrelenting.”

“Somethings are important.” 

“Somethings aren’t.”

“Then will you continue to avoid me?”

“Who said I was avoiding you?” The words are muffled with laughter, Bellatrix obviously delighting in annoying Hermione. 

“If I throw myself off this cliff Tonks will likely hold you responsible.”

“Just her? Please. My entire family has taken to you. Even Narcissa would likely side with them and toss me right after you.” 

“I suppose you wouldn’t be able to avoid me very well then.”

“Ah yes, our stains would be quite close. That cannot do.” Hermione’s undignified snort causes Bellatrix to laugh once more. She stands to leave, mission accomplished. Whatever awkwardness had settled between them is resolved and she is ready to meet up with Tonks. 

The longer she spends near Bellatrix the more sure she is that she hadn’t said one particular thing to unnerve her. She wasn’t easily offended and even if so she’s sure Bellatrix would have used her own words as weapons. She hadn’t mentioned what she had done or said wrong and in fact was eager to move past. Hermione would guess Bellatrix regrets her vulnerability. She was open to Hermione, too open perhaps. She knows what it like to regret saying too much. She knows what it’s like to want to avoid that person. She had just thought Bellatrix beyond such things. 

“You’re leaving.” Her challenging yet sad tone, one Hermione is becoming quickly familiar with, is back. 

“I have plans with Tonks. I’ll be back.” 

“I don’t care about that. You can do whatever you like.” It a sharp rebuttal, disgust at having been interpreting for having cared about Hermione’s presence one way or another. “I mean the island.” Hermione stumbles, fear at the woman’s reaction. She had threatened to kill her to protect her sisters and her secrecy. “Be careful!” Sharp again but worried. She wonders if Bellatrix realizes how much she contradicts herself. 

“How’d you know?” 

“Why wouldn’t you? My sisters may be foolish enough to believe you at ease here but I know you seek to leave.”   
“What are you going to do about it?”

“Get you off my island of course.” She wasn’t going to stop her. That comes as a surprise to Hermione. 

“No threats?” Bare feet scraped against stone as the woman stands. Since she’s no longer actively avoiding Hermione she can return to her quarters. 

“You’re the threat sweetling.” It’s rough, like it came from Bellatrix’s chest. A rumble of words close to Hermione’s ear, she can feel a shiver travel down her spine. Bellatrix leaves and Hermione remains. Hermione swallows harder than necessary and continues out of the courtyard. She isn’t sure what Bellatrix meant. If she is a threat why would she let her go? She wasn’t about to ask the woman. She isn’t sure what exactly happened back there but figured it was best to avoid becoming so tongue-tied near Bellatrix again. 

Tonks wants to explore an area of the island with her. Tonks already knows it but was serious about wanting to show Hermione everything. Hermione enjoys her time with Tonks and readily agreed. Of course she couldn’t just make it there.

“Hermione, on your way out?” Andromeda again. Twice today, more than she’s seen her in a week. 

“Meeting up with Tonks.”

“I see.” There’s more. She can feel it in the tension, the heavy way her words land. She wants to say more but is battling herself. Hermione just wants to leave but knows she can’t, not until Andromeda either talks or leaves. “Do you know why we sing?” Hermione’s stomach turns. Of all the conversations to have, this is perhaps the last one she wants. “It’s an escape. It’s a way to let some of the pain out. This existence can be a miserable one. A life filled with pain and suffering. Such loneliness I fear no one but my sisters can ever really understand. The scars of our past haunt us.” Her voice is wet, teary. Hermione doesn’t know if she’s crying or if she is simply distraught but she is better off not knowing. “We’re so very old and have had such little joy in our lives, singing brings us some semblance of peace. A brief respite from the pain.” A shuttered breath. She’s gathering herself, emotions raw and her words truthful. “I can never make up for what we did, what I did. I shall wear their deaths for life and whatever awaits us after. Just know, I am deeply sorry. I never meant for anyone to die. I just wanted to stop hurting.”

Hermione is speechless once more for a different reason. Her guts wrench and her own tears are close. She doesn’t know what to say. She knows Andromeda had never meant to hurt anyone. She thinks Andromeda only hurts people with intent. Unlike Draco who’s barbs can dig deeper than intended at times, Andromeda always means her ill will. She logically knows it was an accident. It doesn’t stop the hatred. It doesn’t still her racing blood. 

It also means she has been less subtle than she thought. 

Andromeda knows why she avoids her, likely of the anger she tries her best to hide. She knows and is here trying to explain. She knows and she isn’t harming or killing her as Hermione had thought she would. She needs to stop believing she understands them. She keeps messing it up.

She wants to let it go. This anger, this desire to hurt the sisters, she wants to breathe without the threat of vitriol threatening to choke her. She doesn’t know how to let it go. She doesn’t know how to mend her dead friends and this woman. She doesn’t know how to cope between wanting to bash her head in and wrap her in a warm embrace. 

“That’s all I wanted to say. Have fun with Tonks.” Andromeda spares her from having to come up with a response. She is grateful. She doesn’t know what it would have been and fears finding out. 

When she meets up with Tonks, she hugs the girl tighter and longer than usual. Tonks doesn’t ask. She wraps her arms around Hermione and indulges her, happy to prolong the hug. 

Tonks notices her exhaustion and instead of her planned tour she takes them to the beach. Tonks hands her a canteen of something distinctly not water and sits besides her. She talks of her childhood and getting along with Draco and doesn’t ask Hermione to contribute. 

Her anger has been a rope. A rope with no slack and no give. Just a rope pulled so tight it was iron. It burns her to hold onto, fibers of her hatred lodging themselves into her. Such anger and hate changes a person, poisons their heart. After her encounter with Andromeda she can feel the rope slip, give just a little. It hurts in its own way. She’s still holding onto it, her loyalty to her friends too deep to give up. She’ll keep holding on through sheer determination if necessary. But, it slips just a fraction.


	7. Back Home

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen I know this is short and from Luna’s POV but I sweAR I’m working on the next chapter just had to get this out of my head

The air shimmers with a million fairies. They’re so small that most don’t see them or won’t see them but she does. Some are scared of the gods. Fear of something they don’t understand manifesting into a self-inflicted isolation from the unknown. Others refuse to believe. They don’t believe in gods or magic or the impossible. Luna accepts what people believe but wishes more could experience this. 

She’s walking through the western forests, the mud squishing between her toes. It’s always muddy here, wet and soft. Luna loves it. It’s her favorite place to spend the afternoons with the sun shining down. It doesn’t light the woods because the canopy is too thick. The fairies are their own light. She misses Hermione. Hermione always came with her. She liked the mud. Before they talked she’d turn her nose up at Luna’s fascination with the fairies but Luna understands. Always did understand. 

She misses Hermione most days but she knows it’s for the best. It ends the best this way.

“You look like a nymph.” Luna smiles before turning towards her betrothed. The blues and purples reflect off her freckled face. Ginny is smiling at her and her eyes sparkle with love. Luna feels light with her love so close and in her forests. Luna turns and spins her dress swaying with the motion. Ginny doesn’t like coming out here. She doesn't see the fairies or understand Luna’s love for them. She’ll come out sometimes but never for long, usually just to fetch Luna. 

“You look like a troll.” Ginny blinks and lets out a scoff.

“I’d be quick to elaborate.”

“Like if anyone tried to cross your bridge to me you’d toss them away.” Ginny has been more protective than usual lately. She’s scared. No one has heard from The Deathly Hallows. It’s been weeks of silence and Ginny fears the worst. Luna knows it will only get worse. 

“I’d throw them so far they’d need a map to get back.” Ginny’s boast is warm. It’s loving reassurance she thinks Luna needs. Ginny is the one who needs the assurance. Who needs to be told it will all be okay and that the Hallows is safe. She will never lie to Ginny. She extends a hand towards Ginny who’s carefully not in the worst of the mud. “I thought I am a troll. Trolls don’t dance.”

“That’s absurd. Of course they do.” She isn’t sure why Ginny thinks they wouldn’t. Dancing is as natural as breathing. She doesn’t know if there’s any creature that doesn’t dance. Dancing and singing are primal parts of a person. 

Luna thrives in the organic movements. The way one movement bleeds into the next and even if she messes it up it isn’t irreparable. It’s just the flow of nature. When Ginny indulges her it only makes it better. The harmony of two people entangled in the cosmos. 

“Who am I to argue?” She takes Luna’s hand and walks deeper. The fairies flutter excitedly, circling around the pair. Ginny knows better to take the lead now. At first, she’d always tried. She thought someone had to lead. It’s better when no one leads. When they both fall together and move as their own.

Ron hated watching it. He called it utter chaos. He wasn’t wrong.

The third time Luna steps on Ginny’s foot she decides to just stay there. She feels like she’s hovering. Floating in ecstasy. Ginny, fairies, dancing, mud. Her favorite things. 

“You make everyday better.” Luna smiles at Ginny’s words. She leans up and kisses Ginny. They’re both smiling too hard to keep kissing so Luna tugs her wrist. “Where are we going?”

“You came here to get me. We’re going home.” 

“We can stay longer if you want.” Ginny tucks a lock of hair behind her ear.

“No, it’s time to go.” She kisses Ginny’s fingers before taking her hand. She drags Ginny towards their home who is now apparently reluctant to go home.

She decides to slow down. Enjoy the moment. Watch Ginny’s ever present smile rise and dip whenever Luna amuses her. Ginny holds herself with pride but humility. She’s confident but not a fool. She’s never been a fool.

“We should see if Remus needs any help later.” Ginny says as their home comes in view. Luna’s smile wobbles for the first time all day. Ginny notices and looks worried. “We don’t have to if you don’t want to. 

“No, I want to. I want nothing more.” 

“Then what’s wrong?”

“Ginny! Luna!” The port boy is running towards them desperately, Ginny hasn’t noticed yet. 

“Thank you for coming out today.”

“Don’t thank me, it’s the happiest I’ve been in a while. I love you, don’t think you can get rid of me now.” It nearly rips Luna’s heart out but she knows this is nothing, not yet.

“Ginny! I have a letter for you.” He’s out of breath when he reaches them but he hands the letter over. Ginny hands him a few coins and he wanders off. Ginny opens the letter and Luna watches the devastation crawl across her face. Slow, then all at once. 

“They’ve declared the Deathly Hallows missing and likely shipwrecked.” Luna doesn’t say anything. She knows she doesn’t have to. Ginny’s never been a fool. “You knew.” It’s pointed, twisted and angry. Her words are blades beaten and burned in a forged, sharpened to jagged edges, ready to saw their way past Luna’s ribcage. 

“Ginny-”

“You knew. You didn’t want to go on the journey. It was random, it didn’t make sense. Not until you told me you wanted to focus on us.” The letter crinkles in Ginny’s hand as her theories build into reality. “You’ve always known things people don’t know. They always joked you could see the future but I dissuaded it as jokes. They’re just jokes. People can’t see the future.” She seems to be trying to convince herself. “But you can. You have before. You just know things.” She takes a step closer to Luna. “You knew they were all going to die and you did nothing?”

“It had to happen Ginny.” 

“It had to happen? My brothers, my family and our friends had to die?” 

“What is must be but what can be should be.” 

“I don’t care Luna! I don’t care about whatever seer prophecy lies you have going on. I care that you let them die. You killed them.” It’s harsh, Luna knew it was coming but it still reached the dark corners of her chest. Her heart beats against the blade that buries itself deeper.

“I didn’t kill them Ginny.”

“Yes, you did. Inaction is murder. You chose to let them go, you chose not to warn them, you chose to survive and hide, gods you even helped convince Hermione to join them. How could you do that to them? To me?” 

“There was no other way Ginny. It was always going to happen. No matter what I said, no matter what I did. No matter what anyone did the Deathly Hallows was always going to crash with our friends on it.”

“There’s always a way Luna. Any way is better than this. I don’t even know who you are anymore.”

“Of course you know who I am! I’m the same person I’ve always been.”

“I can’t talk to you right now, I just can’t. Don’t come home. Stay with someone tonight.” 

She knew it was going to happen. She’s known for a while. Despite this, when Ginny leaves her ring in Luna’s hand, she feels the jagged edge finally locate her heart. It’s a gaping wound now, pulled at the edges in the effort to find her heart. It’s a quick bleeding wound, each beat of her heart quickening the splurts of blood. She’s drowning in it. This bloody heartbreak. Her lifeline is the ring in her palm and it doesn’t float.

She watches Ginny walk away until she can no longer see her. Then, she lets herself drown.


	8. Fisherman’s Tale

It’s hotter than usual. The heat is sweltering causing Hermione to sweat. It’s too hot to wear Harry’s jacket but she carefully folded and put it away safely in her quarters. She’s resting in shade trying not to die of the heat while Bellatrix hammers away. 

She had thought Bellatrix was joking when she said she’d help. She thought maybe the most Bellatrix would do is run interference with the sisters but she’d herded Hermione onto a far beach early this morning. 

She’s been gathering wood and decided to build Hermione a boat. Hermione had laughed and received an earful for it. It’s the last thing she’d expected of Bellatrix. Hermione hadn’t taken her as a builder.

“Are you going to sit over there all day?” Bellatrix sounds breathless after hours of lifting and hammering.

“I would be in a much cooler cave if you hadn’t dragged me out here.”

“I’m building you a ship.” Anything Bellatrix can build herself is definitely a boat and not a ship but she won’t mention that.

“So you can get me off your island. It’s not exactly out of good will.”

“I’m nothing but goodwill. I could make you build this.”

“You wouldn’t be happy if anyone but you did it.” 

“Think you know me after a few weeks?”

“I know you enough.”

Bellatrix’s grumbles are washed away by the waves and the hammering continues. She wished Bellatrix had told her she’d be under a tree for the whole day, she would have brought her casts. As it is she has nothing else to do but listen to Bellatrix and think. Luckily time with Bellatrix takes her away from the more bitter thoughts. Time outside, in the sun, feels nice even as hot as it is.

Things have been...easier. The tension between Andromeda and her has eased slowly. She feared there would be awkwardness from their conversation but it didn’t happen. Andromeda is around more, like she is tired of their game. Hermione doesn’t refuse her. The anger doesn’t fight to explode anymore, it just exists. It’s become part of her, part of her relationship with Andromeda. 

There is a relationship between them now. Andromeda talks about herself, Tonks, her life at large. She asks about Hermione’s life as well. It’s obvious to Hermione that Andromeda is done being overly careful with her. It’s a relief because it frees her in the same way. Andromeda knows of her anger, that much Hermione learned from their conversation, and is able to persevere through it. They’re more than cohabitants on Azkaban. 

Her days have a rhythm now. They’re not always the same, but they have patterns that have become familiar. She plots her escape and spends her days with the occupants. 

“Fuck!” Bellatrix calls out after the distinct sound of a dull hammer strike.

“Bella?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“You sound like you’re about to rip the boat apart, come over here.”

“Ship.”

“My mistake.”

Regardless, Bellatrix walks over and drops with a huff. She’s silent and almost certainly fuming so Hermione waits. She waits because she knows Bellatrix will break the silence. She always does. Hermione no longer has to push for conversations. She’s glad she ambushed Bellatrix in the courtyard for that at least. 

Bellatrix was right, she does make comments that teeter on offending Hermione. She just as often makes comments that make Hermione do a double take. She’d rather have Bellatrix and her harshest than not at all. If Bellatrix makes too biting of a comment she can tell her as much or toss back her own words. If she isn’t here, Hermione is left to her own devices. 

“What’s your favorite book?”

“Why?”

“I’m curious. A person’s favorite book says a lot about them.” Hermione agrees with her. It’s a method she’s used in the past to pass judgement on classmates.

“Will you tell me yours?”

“Of course, fair’s fair.” She doesn’t trust Bellatrix’s mischievous laugh. She’ll assume whatever Bellatrix tells her will likely not be her favorite.

“It’s called _Fisherman’s Tale_. Every day the main character, fisherman, wakes up and goes to the port. He spends his day hauling in fish and gutting them. Thankless work, every day. It’s his life and will be until the day he dies. He doesn’t try and leave the fishing in anyone else’s hands-“

“He’s hauling fish in alone?”

“It’s an allegory not a historical piece.”

“I’m just saying he must be the most capable man in that village to operate a ship and the nets-“

“Bellatrix.”

“Continue, if you must.” 

“Anyways, he fishes. The town faces a famine. The kind that has families dying off. The mayor decides he wants to be a hero. There’s rumors of a caravan in the desert to the east. Believing these caravans would have enough food to feed his people he sets out his a large portion of their remaining stores. The people are in a worse way. Everyday they wait for his return. Every day they wait, the Fisherman boards his boat alone and brings in enough fish to keep them alive. No one notices. Finally, the mayor’s horse returns.”

“Not the mayor?”

“He is never seen again. There is an outcry and fears spreads throughout the people. Until a little boy says “it’s lucky we have the old fisherman”. They all recognize that he’s been keeping them alive and send their strongest on his next trip. They bring back even more fish working together.”

“You like stories about heroes?” The disdain is as clear as whenever the word passes her lips.

“The hero dies in the story. It’s not about heroes.”

Bellatrix hums. “It’s about people. He does his part and it’s enough and when they all work together they find their salvation.” Hermione nods but doesn’t expect Bellatrix’s booming laughter. 

“What?” Bellatrix keeps laughing, it’s a wet forced sound. It sounds like she can’t stop and Hermione feels her ear pinken. She should have just told Bellatrix a fake story.

“It’s just that-“ She fails at keeping her laughter under control and has to try again. “It’s just that your favorite story is about people but you hate them.”

“I don’t hate people!”

“You do! You still snap at poor Draco like a rabid wolf.” She has a point but Hermione still scowls at her. “I’ve never seen you hold a civil conversation with Cissa. Listening to you two interact gives me a headache. Somehow you manage to despise Andromeda. I can never get away with being snappy at her but you get by the pair of them.” 

“Excuse me if I’m not quite comfortable with them.” She foolishly snaps back. She’s done her best to avoid directly admitting to holding a grudge against Andromeda and Narcissa even if it seems they all know. 

“Hermione.” It jolts her how odd hearing her name from Bellatrix sounds. She sounds old in this moment. Tired of an unending life where Hermione is their greatest diversion from boredom. She wants to reach out and comfort Bellatrix but hesitates after the last time she had done as much.

“You gonna kill me now?” It’s mostly a joke. She remembers Bellatrix taking her to the ledge and asking her about her feelings towards the sisters. The promise of death. She also happens to know Bellatrix better than she did then. Which is why then Bellatrix breathes out a soft no she isn’t surprised. “I’m sorry.” She is. She’s sorry she’s torn Bellatrix’s loyalties between her sisters and their burgeoning relationship. It must be difficult to balance. 

“Don’t be. Some things are beyond our control.” Hermione wish she knew the layers to Bellatrix’s word. She wishes she knew some way to wipe away the dark sadness that threatens to cloud Bellatrix.

“So, your favorite story?”

“Don’t think I’m letting go of yours. I’m still of the mind you despise people.” 

“Only the boring ones.”

“Is that why you adore me? I’m honored.”

“You’re mistaken. I’m afraid I tolerate you at best.” Bellatrix’s cackle makes her smile. The cloud has moved on for now and Hermione is glad she was able to change the winds. 

“My favorite doesn’t have a translation in your language.” 

“How old is it?” 

“Very.” 

“How old are you?”

“Even more so. It’s about a house spirit and a widow. The widow’s husband had died in war leaving her childless in a home too large for one person. She continues living, working, but is left hollow. She refuses to remarry despite the growing loneliness. Her love for her husband is too great to even consider it. She wishes they had children before he had left but it is too late for her.

The housework starts getting away from her. She starts getting lost in old food and clutter. She’s too busy working herself to the bone and sleeping when she gets home. One day, the food is cleared away. The next, the soiled clothes. The house miraculously becomes clean once more. Moreover, the shadow of her dead husband starts to fade. 

A local priest tells her about house spirits. He believes she has one and she concurs. Nothing else would explain the change. Except, the spirit doesn’t only clean and take. One afternoon she returns from work to find a letter. It’s stained in blood and written in her husband’s hand. She becomes certain that the house spirit is actually her husband’s spirit.”

When Bellatrix doesn’t continue she prompts her. “And then?”

“They’re together until she dies as well and joins him in the spirit plain.”

This was not the story she was expecting from Bellatrix. It is certainly her favorite story and not a made up one to embarrass Hermione. She’d expected something explicit and ridiculous meant to terrorize her. Instead, it had been honest. Perhaps too honest. “You’re a romantic?”

“No! It’s a story about sacrifice and-“

“You’re a romantic.”

“Say it again and I’ll reopen the subject of your untimely death.” She knows Bellatrix would never kill her, not anymore. She doesn’t say it. She doesn’t push her about the story either. She knows Bellatrix is vulnerable right now. She can hear it in the barely contained rage, the violence close to her teeth. Hermione has her lines she doesn’t want Bellatrix crossing but she knows the gorgon has her own lines. Hermione knows this is one and steps back. 

She attempts to pivot the conversation to avoid tripping over Bellatrix’s line with a joke. “Well, it’s a good thing you can read since you can’t build a boat.” She knows when the snakes explode in a series of hisses and Bellatrix shifts she miscalculated.

Bellatrix is closer than before and her voice is crackling with anger. “At least I’m trying to build you a ship. You think you’re immune to my anger human? I have killed hundreds, thousands even. Trained armies and heroes have fallen before me. You are nothing but a village girl. I would think before I so carelessly toss my life away.” She hears Bellatrix stomp away and she rubs her face in irritation. The conversation had almost went well. 

She heads back to the caves since Bellatrix is seemingly done with her for the day. She regrets ever having to have left them. Their coolness embraces her immediately. She’s certain she’ll be sunburned despite hiding in the shade as long as she could. 

Despite the disastrous end to their day, Bellatrix was right. She has been rather terrible to Draco and Tonks. She’s likely been rather superior to a lot of people in hindsight. She’d never noticed and none of her friends had mentioned it. Ron had teased her for being bookish and no fun but he’d never mentioned this. 

It’s true. She’d thought herself better than Luna for years. She thought herself smarter than the Weasley family for just as long. Despite the fact she’d seen Ron devastate their friends during games due to his strategy or the ingenuity of George and Fred’s inventions. She knows she needs to work on it and makes a note to herself to do better.

She hears sobs before she identifies the voice. Her feet shuffle towards the sound. Her step is light enough that Andromeda doesn’t hear her approach and her snakes don’t warn her. She’s lucky they decided to be on her side, perhaps they can sense her intentions. She doesn’t know much about them. She should ask Bellatrix more about them when their tension has passed. 

She wraps an arm around Andromeda’s shoulders and feels for what she’s sitting on. It’s a stone bench. She slides down next to Andromeda, keeping her arm wrapped loosely around her trying not to make her feel trapped. Andromeda stiffens and tries to swallow her sobs only for the next to choke violently out. The snakes brush up against Hermione’s hair as soon as she’s close enough. 

She’s noticed Bellatrix’s snakes have more range, they can move further away from Bellatrix’s head which makes her think they’re longer. Bellatrix also seems to have more snakes in general. Andromeda’s are fewer and shorter. They’re much more curious and tactile than Bellatrix’s. Only one snake of Bellatrix’s tries to seek contact since that first exploration. She’s secretly named her Nagini but she doesn’t know if the sisters have already named them or even if they’re smart enough to have named themselves.

She wonders if the snakes are affected by the hosts, if they share certain personality traits. Andromeda herself is much more tactile. She wouldn’t have dared comfort Bellatrix this way and she much prefers Bellatrix. 

“I’m sorry.” Andromeda is trying to contain her sobs, her body shakes with the effort.

“What’s wrong?” She could hazard a guess. 

“Nothing. I’m afraid I’m just having a moment.” This isn’t a moment but she feels too conflicted to say as much. Part of her doesn’t want to comfort this woman. The other part can’t bear to hear her pain. 

Andromeda stiffens and Hermione recalls her arm. Most of the snakes pull back sensing the end of the moment. She helps gently guide the others out of her hair and back to their host. “I’ll see you later.” She squeezes Andromeda’s shoulder gently and leaves the room with as much decorum as she can muster. She could sense the awkwardness Andromeda felt as soon as the sobs faded and she didn’t want to make her more uncomfortable. She also didn’t want to be there much longer. 

She doesn’t exactly want to leave Andromeda in shambles either. She could get Bellatrix but the thought of giving the older woman the satisfaction of Hermione breaking their feud stops her. She hesitates but starts towards a room she’s intentionally avoided.

She knocks on the archway that holds no door.

“Yes?” Narcissa’s poised voice greets her. 

“Can I come in?”

“Of course.” She hears Narcissa set something aside but she isn’t sure what. 

“I think you should check up on Andromeda.” It hurts to say. It hurts to offer help to someone she still holds responsible but she does it anyways. 

She does it because it’s right, because it’s something her friends would have done. She has let this hate colonize her body for its own. It’s built higher and burned hotter until it’s consumed her. She let it. She can’t keep letting it rot her soul. She’s afraid of what she’ll become. No person is meant to hate this strongly, this fiercely. 

“What’d you do?” Each word is delivered like a whip across her flesh. Narcissa walks closer and Hermione is quick to elaborate before her skin really does split beneath Narcissa’s anger. 

“I didn’t do anything.” Narcissa’s footsteps falter. She’s still close and Hermione knows this is a terrible time to fail their game of words. So she abandons their game. She wipes away their pieces and burns their board just to be safe. This game won’t be about who wins and where the other’s pieces are. This game will be about reality. This game will be no game at all. “I found her crying. I tried helping but I don’t think I’m the right person for the job.”

The pause from Narcissa is thick. She’s likely realizing Hermione spoke too plainly, realizing their game has changed. “I am?” It seems Narcissa still clings to the game. The shroud of words thick as always. Meanings layered upon one another. How Hermione answers will determine their future. 

“You’re the best person for it.” Narcissa and her have had a cold relationship but she’s seen the way Narcissa is with her family. The easy love she carries for them. Not only Draco but all of them. She’ll take up for Andromeda when Bellatrix is in a mood. She’ll do the same if Andromeda snips too much at Bellatrix. She is as much a parental figure to Tonks as Andromeda. She has a multitude of faces and an illusion of herself she uses to shield herself from Hermione. It still isn’t strong enough to hide the love she carries.

“I suppose I am.” It’s the first real sentence she’s ever heard from her. It’s without the guards and chill that protects their every interaction. It’s without the guide of tricking one another. It’s honest and organic. She brushes passed Hermione, knuckles making contact against Hermione’s. She recognizes as intentional considering Narcissa has mastered avoiding her in every way. She recognizes the gratitude when she feels it. 

Narcissa goes to help Andromeda and Hermione leaves her room.

She hopes Narcissa is able to give Andromeda the help she needs. 

“Cissy scare you off?” Bellatrix’s smooth voice cuts through her thoughts. She hadn’t heard the woman she’d been so far in her own head. 

“Actually, I think we finally had that civil conversation you were talking about.”

“Oh?” Bellatrix sounds surprised. Too surprised to remember she’s supposed to be angry at Hermione at least. 

She keeps walking to her room but stops near Bellatrix so her voice won’t unnecessarily carry. “I have...complicated feelings towards your sisters.” She can hear the snakes pick up speed as they do whenever Bellatrix is bothered. “I just want you to know no matter how complicated my feelings, I would never harm them.” It feels right. Something feels right for the first time since she’d heard the singing. 

She’s not torn in two about this. She doesn’t feel guilty about finding herself at ease on this island, with this family. She doesn’t feel like she’s shaming her friend’s memory. She can feel Harry’s assurance in this moment. It settles around her as comforting as his jacket. She knows even Ron, in all his anger and blunder, would be okay with her decision. Hermione doesn’t want to harm the sisters. She doesn’t want that blood and death on her soul the way she suspects it clogs the sisters’ hearts. She hears Andromeda’s ragged sobs and doesn’t want that for herself. 

“Or you.” She walks away after that, not wanting to face Bellatrix’s particular brand of lashing out. 

A hand yanks on her arm and she almost punches Bellatrix. “Calm down.” 

“Tonks?” 

“Obviously.” 

She doesn’t sound right. Not like Tonks usually sounds. Tonks is the heart of this island. At least, that’s how Hermione views her. Right now that softness and easy manner of hers is missing. Hermione often thinks of Tonks having Andromeda’s best qualities. Right now, she has her more terrifying. The cold detachment in her voice makes Hermione’s heart speed up just as it has the first time she’d heard it in Andromeda’s.

“Where are we going?” Tonks has been quickly leading them through the caves.

“You’ll see.” 

She leads them outside the caves. Hermione knows this when the heat returns biting at her sun kissed cheeks. She leads them down the slope leading to the beach but hooks a tight left. She leads them into a secondary cave system through a narrow entrance that Hermione hadn’t known existed. After a few moments of near running, Tonks stops. Tonks’ hand reaches for Hermione’s and she drags it up. Rough splinters of wood meets her hand.

“I know you’re planning on leaving.” The harshness starts making sense. “This is a ship not whatever bucket auntie Bella is trying to make.” Her voice is shaking with barely restrained emotion and it hurts Hermione’s heart to hear Tonks so torn. “So if you’re going to leave us, do it before we get even more attached to you.” 

“Tonks.” Tonks pulls away at her gentle tone. “Tonks this isn’t about leaving you. I would miss you. I’d miss you everyday.” She hears Tonks’ breath shudder and she’s afraid she’s going to have to comfort both mother and daughter today. The difference is, she thinks she could capably comfort Tonks. She pulls Tonks into a tight hug which she immediately reciprocates. 

“I miss you already.” Tonks confesses.

“So do I.”

Tonks pulls back and laughs, uncomfortable with her near breakdown. “Not to be insensitive but how do you plan on sailing back?”

“Something Luna told me before I left. She’s always had a way of knowing things that would happen. Admittedly it was usually small things. She told me the water would protect me. I think she knows I’d have to sail back home alone.” 

“Why didn’t she see the crash?”

She isn’t sure how to begin to answer that. 

“We can’t know everything.”


	9. Misplaced Faith

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tw for discussion of past rape, it’s not graphic but putting the warning up just in case. Compliant with Medusa’s origin story. Skip passed the lines if you don’t want to read it.

“You look nice.” Bellatrix’s soft tone interrupts her nap.

“Narcissa gave me a new shirt. Apparently she’s had this the whole time.” It’s looser and more suited for the hot season that’s befallen them. 

“Are you two best friends now?” Even Hermione couldn’t miss the crisp jealousy.

“Since my last one seems to have abandoned me, yes.” It’s a lie of course. Narcissa and her have exchanged a few more words but are hardly friends. They’re friendly, friendly enough to share clothes at the very least. 

“Were we best friends?” Bellatrix purrs, much closer than she’d expected. 

“I thought so.” Her words are short but she doesn’t take them back. She’s tired of the back and forth.

Bellatrix sighs heavily behind her, as if it’s Hermione’s fault she threw another tantrum. Bellatrix’s fingers graze her shoulder, not quite lingering but establishing the first contact in a long time. “I’m sorry.”

“I shouldn’t have teased so much.” She knew she was playing a dangerous game, she could sense how upset Bellatrix was getting. Still, she pushed Bellatrix. It’s not really a surprise she reacted as she did, Hermione had expected it.

“That’s the basis of our relationship, Hermione.” Bellatrix soft huff of laughter surprises Hermione. “I want to take you somewhere, will you come?” It’s tentatively offered and Hermione doesn’t hesitate to accept. 

“Why’d you snap then?” 

“My irritation was close to the skin.” Bellatrix says. Hermione tries not to visibly startle when Bellatrix interlocks their fingers. It’s the second time Bellatrix has initiated contact and she’s honestly trying not to implode with shock. 

They don’t speak much but Bellatrix’s willingness to seek her out and the ease with which she touches Hermione speaks volumes. Bellatrix regrets her outburst, wants to make up for it. More than any other outburst it would seem. She realizes her overreaction and doesn’t want them to avoid each other, Bellatrix actually wants to resolve it and is willing to take the necessary steps. 

It gives Hermione a good feeling, one that she can’t help but smile at. Not having to do all the work, not having to work to get passed Bellatrix’s defenses, is an inexplicably warm feeling. The gesture of taking her somewhere and of actually apologizing leaves Hermione reeling. 

They start going uphill, it’s steep and Hermione’s legs are quick to fight her. She’s always been an active person between exploring with her friends and mapping the island, but this path seems to be trying to kill her.

“We’re almost there, I know it’s a bit of a trek.” Bellatrix answers her unvoiced question. 

“You could always carry me.” If anything the breathless tired voice should only further prove her point.

“Don’t dare me.” Bellatrix laughs her suggestion off. She’d have rathered not walking up this mountain anymore but she’ll take Bellatrix’s laughter instead.

When it finally evens out Bellatrix pulls them to a stop. “We’re here.”

“Where’s here?”

Bellatrix leads them a bit further and stops. The wind is a bit stronger this high up. “This is where my sisters and I lived before the caves. Draco and Nymphadora use these now.” 

“Tonks.”

“What?”

“She prefers Tonks.” She can feel Bellatrix puffing up, ready to posture and toss her weight around. “If you wanted to be called something else and other people didn’t honor it, wouldn’t that offend you?” She felt Bellatrix deflate. Hermione doesn’t bother mentioning that she knows there’s a name Bellatrix doesn’t like to be called. 

“Draco and Tonks.” Bellatrix replies obediently. 

“Why don’t you live here anymore?”

“It’s too dangerous. We haven’t tested the theory but considering Draco and N- Tonks’ lack of snakes we believe they too could be turned to stone. The caves ensure they can’t accidentally walk into us. We never come here unless we specifically request it, we alert them every time we leave the caves.” Hermione knew most of that but for some reason they’ve never brought her here.

“Why didn’t you stay here and put them in the caves?” 

“No children of ours will live in a cave, even if they’re grown.” The protectiveness in Bellatrix’s voice makes Hermione turn her head away. Bellatrix would misinterpret Hermione’s smile. She’s proud of Bellatrix’s fierce love, overjoyed at the thought of how much she cares for her niece and nephew.

“Oh. Why haven’t they shown me this place?”

“They don’t always live here. Sometimes they live in other places. They know how much it means to me, perhaps they thought it best to leave it be.”

“Why does it mean so much to you?” 

Bellatrix sits down and Hermione follows suit. They’re sitting on some type of stone steps. “It’s my favorite place on the island.” She hears the scrape of flesh over stone, perhaps Bellatrix is running a hand over the stone. “That’s why I built our home here.” 

“You built it?” Her eyebrows raise in surprise. After the failed boat making she assumed Bellatrix was useless with building. 

“Don’t sound so surprised.” What once might have been a threat now mostly sounds like a pout.

“Why here?”

“It’s the first place I saw beauty again.” Hermione has a lot of questions about that statement. “For a long time, life became...grey.” 

“Because you can’t leave the island?” 

“Yes. Yes and so much more.”

“Are you okay now?”

Bellatrix lets out a sad laugh. “I’m better now than I have been for decades, mortal. You’ve never asked how we became what we are.”

“I didn’t think I should.”

“Would you like to know?” 

“Will it hurt you to share?” She’s certain the answer will be yes, with the way Bellatrix has slowly receded into herself. She is curious, of course she is, but she doesn’t want to cause Bellatrix any undo stress. Hurting Bellatrix strikes deep at her own heart.

“Yes.”

She reaches out and squeezes Bellatrix’s hand. “Then I don’t need to know.”

“I think...it’s something I need you to know.” Bellatrix says as if she’s convincing herself. It’s like she isn’t sure she can tell the story.

“You don’t need to tell me but I’ll listen.” It’s the best she can do. She can be an ear or she can distract her from the past. 

____________________________________________________________________________ 

“Once, I was a priestess.” Hermione tries to contain her surprise but she must have done a poor job because Bellatrix laughs at her expression. “I’m not the most devout, I can understand why it’s hard to see.”

“I can see you’d be a capable priestess, I just don’t see the desire.”

“I was. I was devout, chaste, obedient, faithful, dedicated. All things a priestess should be. I served Voldemort with an unflinching loyalty. I would have dedicated my entire life to him, died for him. It wasn’t to be.” 

“What happened?”

“A different god was jealous. He hated my devotion, lusted after my chastity.” Bellatrix seemingly swallows her words, chokes on the story. Hermione hears it anyways.

Blood rushes to her fists as rage fills her. She knows how the story goes, how the story always goes when the gods want something. She’s spent her whole life hating them and she knew she was right. Anything that could hurt Bellatrix, anyone who deems themselves greater than another, they’re nothing. They’re less than nothing. 

She can’t stop the anger anymore than Bellatrix can get the words out. She’s heard stories of men so strong they could kill gods. She wishes she was one of them in this moment. She wishes she could storm into Hogwarts and behead the lot of them. 

“Voldemort cursed me a gorgon afterwards. I had offended him by being despoiled in his temple. He cursed my sisters with the same affliction.”

“He did what?” Her words are deathly silent and she’s glad she didn’t scream, that she didn’t lose her entire composure. The hate that faded from the sisters has found a new target and it’s as sharp as before. 

“I put my faith in Voldemort and damned my sisters as a result.” 

She can hear the regret and loathing in her words, the way Bellatrix’s voice breaks when mentioning her sisters. Hermione hates that she carries the burden of their suffering as well as her own. As if it’s not enough that she should suffer, her own beloved sisters were taken with her. 

She doesn’t miss the reasoning for the admission either. It’s the same reason she keeps lashing out at Hermione. She’s afraid to trust her, to open herself up to the same pain and betrayal. It’s shocking to her that Bellatrix would compare her friendship to Hermione to her devotion to her god but she understands the comparison enough. She’s afraid of putting her faith in the wrong person again. 

“Maybe it wasn’t meant to be a punishment.” It sounds weak even to her but she needs to it be true. She needs Bellatrix to see her not as a threat, she needs her to know Hermione would never betray her like that. 

“How is this not a punishment?” Bellatrix sounds angry but curious to what Hermione will say next. She has to be careful to word her thoughts right, careful not to mortally offend the other women. 

“It’s possible he never wanted you or your sisters to ever be hurt like that again. No one can ever really hurt you again. Your family is one of the most powerful alive, one look and anyone intending harm would die. They have, countless have tried hurting your family. They’ve all died. I don’t think you’re cursed.”

Bellatrix is silent as she mulls the words over before she exhales and lays her head down in Hermione’s lap. “Maybe.” She doesn’t sound convinced but she does sound tired. Weary from revealing a vulnerability.

____________________________________________________________________________

Hermione tries to control her breathing at Bellatrix’s new position. Her level of comfort is going to grey Hermione by the end of the day. Going from no contact to Andromeda levels of tactile is stressing Hermione out. She feels a snake, likely Nagini, nudge against her hand and she takes the hint.

She runs her fingers across the snakes smooth skin. She’s careful, maybe overly careful, but she doesn’t want to hurt any of the snakes or Bellatrix herself. The snakes seem happy enough, wiggling for her attention. Nagini hogs most of it, eagerly intercepting her fingers. Sometimes even going as far as bumping others out of the way. The others still wander over even though they’re usually not as tactile. She is sure to move her fingers around to some who can’t reach her. 

Bellatrix hums pleased with the easy contact, she settles in Hermione’s lap. Hermione can still feel the stress coming off of Bellatrix and decides a conversation change is necessary. 

“You built this place?”

“Mhm.”

“Tell me about it?”

“It’s made of stone. I thought stone would stand against the weather well and I thought it was ironic. There’s moss and wildlife covering most of it now but the stone still stands strong. We’re on the stairs leading to it, there’s some pillars too.”

“Of course, no home is complete without pillars.” 

“Careful, you sound jealous.”

“I absolutely am. How am I going to brag to the neighbors about my pillars if I’m stuck in a grimy cave?” 

“You can always brag about my pool.”

“That’s my favorite place on the island.” She decides if Bellatrix can bare some of her soul, Hermione can offer something too. “I’m sure this place is beautiful and it’s important to you but your room...I feel safe.” Bellatrix’s hand brushes over her knee, another pleased hum comes from her chest.

“I’m glad.” It dangerously close to being too soft, too light. “I also engraved the building.” Bellatrix’s boastful words break the air that was building between them.

“Engraved it?” 

“Mhm, with different stories.”

“The house spirit?”

“It’s on the pillars that lead to the house.”

The peace settles between them as the sun does the horizon. It’s a slow process but Hermione thinks they’re coming to understand one another. They’re not settled, the moon hasn’t yet overtaken, but it’s on its way.

She hesitates to break the moment but decides to tell Bellatrix. “Tonks showed me a ship.”

Bellatrix’s body stills and Hermione’s afraid she’s going to have to deal with another outburst. Bellatrix doesn’t explode but she doesn’t exactly relax either. “Oh?”

“Yeah, I think it’ll sail.”

“That’s great.” Bellatrix replies stiffly. She shouldn’t have broken the silence. The peacefulness has fled to preserve itself, abandoning its acolytes to the unrelenting isolation of the afternoon. 

They leave shortly after and it ends with the same awkward tension. Bellatrix ultimately doesn’t snap or pull away but it leaves Hermione feeling off. They don’t speak of it and she hopes the tension fades before they next talk.

She goes down to the ship to continue checking it with Tonks.

“Hey! You look sweaty.” Tonks calls out to her. 

“Bellatrix took me to the house.”

“Oh yeah mom mentioned that. Looks like you got a good workout from it.”

“I’ll say. Have you seen Draco recently?”

“I’ve spent my entire life trying to avoid him to no avail.” Tonk’s easy humor hides the love she has for her cousin.

“You love him.” Hermione has to call her on it, curious if she’ll fold.

“I do.”

“Is he okay? I haven’t seen him in a bit.”

“Yeah, he’s just being mopey because he knows there’s something we’re not telling him.” Hermione feels bad about it, guilt causing her lips to turn down. “Don’t worry about it, he’d be useless at this. You could just see about giving him some time later and he’ll probably feel better.” 

“Alright, I really didn’t mean to make him feel unwelcome.” 

“We’re all bound to get a bit jealous over who spends time with you.” Hermione feels her cheeks warm up at that. “Aw, you’re adorable. Don’t let this world ruin that for you.” Tonks pulls her into a hug, having disentangled from whatever she was doing. 

“I brought the ship up to Bellatrix and she acted...off.”

“How so?”

“I don’t know, she got distant. How come she didn’t know it was here?” It confuses Hermione how Bellatrix could miss a whole ship on her island.

There’s a beat of silence before Tonks exhales an uncomfortable laugh. “Uh, she definitely knew it was here.”

“What? She didn’t tell me there was a ship! She was trying to build me a terrible boat.”

“You know she built the house right?”

“Yeah.”

“So.”

“So?”

“So she’s handy at building things.”

“What are you saying Tonks? She was purposely building boats that couldn’t even float?”

“I’m saying she’s the one who built this ship, Hermione.” It stops Hermione in her tracks. It makes sense but it makes no sense. 

“Why wouldn’t she tell me about it?”

Tonks shifts again, discomfort radiating from her. “That’s something you should probably talk to her about.”

“I’m going to...go see if I can find her.” Hermione stumbles away in a state of shock. The hot sand buries itself between her toes as she wanders across the shoreline.

Bellatrix knows the ship exists, she built the ship, she didn’t tell Hermione. She hid both the ship and the fact she knew about it. Why? What did she have to gain? Is the ship important to her? It’s possible it has some meaning like the house does. If she spent time building the ship it's hardly likely she’s eager to see it go. 

It only makes her feel more guilty. To leave she’d take something important to Bellatrix with her. She doesn’t want to hurt Bellatrix, doesn’t want to take anything from her. It seems impossible not to. She doesn’t know how she’d avoid it considering a lack of other alternatives. 

She’s so lost in her thoughts she misses it the first time. 

She hears something that breaks her train of thought but she isn’t sure what it is. She stops moving and focuses, listens beyond the crashing waves and squawking birds. 

She hears it again, clearly this time.

It’s undoubtedly male, distinctly not Draco.

“Help!”


	10. Turning Tides

He’s heavy, too heavy. The waves keep crashing into her, pushing her away from him and tripping her. She keeps falling beneath the tide but she doesn’t stop trying. The sharp taste of salt has burned its way through her throat, out her nostrils. Everything is crisp water and groans of pain.

“Don’t die trying to save me.” It’s so weak, barely more than a whisper. The man is barely even alive at this point. He’s nearly another tribute to the seas. She refuses to feed the monster anymore. She keeps tugging at his leather straps. 

“You’re not dying.” 

“My foot is caught.” She reaches around to his knife and takes it from his sheath. She leaves his body and trails down to his foot which is indeed stuck in something. She identifies it as netting and sets to cutting him free. The water keeps battering against her, slamming her into the rock he desperately clung to. She spits out another mouthful of salt water when the rope finally gives. She moves back to his shoulders and starts pulling him free. “The shore is the other way.”

She recalculated and starts dragging him along. They both slip and go under more than a few times but she eventually manages to get him ashore. The sand grits against her skin as she pulls him out of the water. He’s too big for her to drag any further. 

She all but collapses, taking in greedy breaths of air. He’s wheezing but unmoving.

“Are you okay?” 

“No.” 

Her hands shake as she reaches for him. “What’s wrong?”

He hesitates for a moment. “I’m bleeding from my side. My leg is likely broken as well.”

“What happened to your side?” 

“A piece of the ship, I took it out.” She bites her lip at that. Her parents were healers, she knows never to take things out without lots of cloth ready. “Not my best decision I take it.” He sounds amused at her reaction.

“Not particularly.” She considers her options. She can’t really tell the others, she knows how they’ll react. It’s only by the grace of loneliness they didn’t outright kill her. Somehow she thinks a man, a man who can see, is more likely to be killed by the sisters. She understands, they’re careful to extinguish a threat to their family. She just can’t condemn anyone to death.

“I need to get you to shelter.” There’s a small alcove nearby she could hide him in. It would do to get him out of the sun as well. Who knows how long he’s burned beneath its gaze. 

“I’m a bit big for you to carry.” She’s aware of the issue but isn’t sure how to fix it.

“Can you walk?”

“I can barely keep my eyes open.”

She’ll have to drag him but it won’t be easy. It’ll jostle his leg and pack sand into his side. It might not be a bad idea to clog the wound to stem the blood flow but it might get infected. “Do you see five trees grown too close, like they’ve grown together? There should be some rocks beneath them.”

“Yes.”

“Point to them.” He takes her hands in a worryingly loose grip and points in the direction. 

“Okay. I’m going to have to drag you over there. It’s going to hurt.”

“Will you manage?”

“I’ll have to.” She decides to take her shirt off and press it to his side in an attempt to stem the blood flow and protect it from the sand. 

“My lady!” He protests, a sense of discretion and shame colors his tone.

“If I don’t do something you’ll die before you even dry off.” She tells him. She cuts the straps away his chest taking off his jerkin. She ties the straps around her shirt securing it to his body. He groans at the contact against his wound but doesn’t protest again. She bunches up scraps of his jerkin and puts it to his lips. “You’re going to want to bite on this.” His lips brush her fingers as he takes it between his teeth.

She moves to his head and considers the best way to drag him. She hadn’t considered it but it’ll pull on his wound as well. There’s nothing to do about it. She reaches beneath his arms and locks her hands together. She picks up his upper body and starts dragging. He groans and screams into the jerkin as they make their way across the shore. 

Her arms shake and legs burn with the strain. Her legs were still sore from her earlier hike and only seemed to get worse. She has to drop him and take a break before they reach their destination. He isn’t moaning anymore so she assumes he passed out. It’s for the best.

It takes four more drags before she makes it to the small open cave. She finishes dragging him in and gives herself a moment to collect her strength. She fetches sticks and quickly builds a fire, she’s glad it isn’t night yet and it won’t be as obvious. She knows Narcissa could help him far better than her but she can’t put anyone in that position. She knows enough from her parents to help him.

She doesn’t have a needle and thread nor does she have time to waste finding any. She heats the knife over the fire and hopes he stays unconscious. She checks her shirt and moves it out of the way. She feels around the wound with her fingers and outlines it. It’s large and if it damaged anything inside there isn’t much she can do. 

She brings the heated knife to his skin and locks her jaw, readying herself for what has to be done. She presses the knife to his wound and hears the sizzle of burning flesh, he must wake back up because his screams start back up but he doesn’t push her away.

“It’s okay, it’s over. You’re okay.” She reaches out to brush his bangs back but finds his hair cropped. It’s odd, most men she has known has longer hair than that. She still tries to soothe his pain. He exhales against her palm before muttering his thanks. It feels wrong to accept them for that. 

She sets to his leg next. She feels around carefully but carefully enough. He flinches violently when she finds the protruding bone. He passes back out when she sets it. She finds sticks sturdy enough to tie along his leg. 

She checks the rest of him, looking for wounds he might have left out. There are scratches and slashes but nothing life threatening. She cuts strips of cloth to lay on those. She finds three fingers not quite right on his left hand. She sets them as well. 

She sits back when it’s done. It’s not enough, she needs to do more. She feels more tired than she has in weeks. Her breathing is still coming quick and her skin feels sensitive from sand burns. She still knows she isn’t done here. 

She stands up and wipes sand from her body. She needs to get him water, food, and better medical care. Clean cloths at least. She has a good amount of supplies stored on her ship.

“I’ll be back.” She says quietly, the absence of screams makes everything louder.

She leaves and heads to the ship, knowing there will be supplies that can help him. When she gets there she puts on one of the spare shirts she packed. She started packing for her journey earlier. With Tonks’ help she got it relatively well stocked.

The man is strong to have survived as long as he has. He’s lost a lot of blood and she still isn’t sure how long it’s been since his crash. It’s possible the water helped him stay on the rock rather than knocking him off.

The water. 

It protected him.

She stops her movements, a cloth cut for bandages clenched in her grip. Is that what Luna meant? No, oh no.

She slides down, back against the railing. How could she be so foolish? Luna hadn’t meant the water would lead her or guide her, it was meant to protect her. It did protect her. She’s the only survivor because of it. It did its job, it fulfilled its prophecy.

Where does that leave her?

She could only sail home because she thought Luna gave her some kind of message. Without the tides in her favor she has no way of getting home. She hugs her legs to her body, squeezing them as tight as she can.

She can’t leave.

The day’s events catch up to her. Bellatrix’s revelation, the man barely clinging to life, her last chance of freedom gone. She wants to rip the ship apart with her bare hands. She wants to dig her fingers into the grain of the wood and pull until it spreads and splinters. She wants to scream until her throat is bloody and raw and the thick taste of iron overpowers the lingering salt. 

It clicks in the worst way, during the worst moment possible, that this must be how the sisters felt. They wanted to scream against their fate. Being condemned to an island because of gods’ cruelty with no power to refute it. Nothing to do but sing their laments.

It’s in this terrible moments she finally, truly, understands the sisters’ struggles. 

A creeping sense of numbness fills her heart. It feels as if it’s gone too far. She’s too angry, too sad, too upset. There’s no escaping Azkaban. Not for any of them.

She feels hands before she registers the person’s presence, her ears are ringing too loud to make out voices. She breathes and focuses on the other person until her heart rate slows down. She remembers when Ginny would get like this, how Hermione could help her calm down. 

_Harry told her about Ginny’s attacks. It was whispered, a confidence. She knows why. She remembers what happened when Hedwig, a boy from Harry’s village, started having attacks. They thought it would be a kinder fate to end his suffering. There was nothing kind about it. Hearing Harry tell her does nothing to prepare her for the reality._

_Ginny’s breathing is so ragged, so violent, that Hermione is so very afraid. She doesn’t know how to stop it, how to help her. Her parents have taught her how to burn wounds closed, how to close them with thread, set bones, clean burns, but nothing like this. This isn’t healing a doctor can teach her. She needs to be quick or Ginny really might suffocate._

_“Ginny, it’s okay. Breathe.” She reaches out to Ginny and it just makes her breathing worse. Hermione takes her hands back and is lost on how to help. She tries backing up to give her space and that makes it worse too. In the end, she sits close to Ginny but doesn’t touch her or crowd her._

_“Just copy my breathing, Ginny. In and out. Draw your breaths like you're about to go under water, deep and long.” Hermione taps a finger on her knee every time she inhales. She just needs to get Ginny to start breathing right._

_It takes a few minutes but eventually Ginny’s breathing slows. “What happened, Gin?”_

_“Lune went over the edge. I couldn’t find her. Ron’s looking for her.”_

_“She’ll be safe. No way Ron would come back without her, he’s too scared of you.”_

_“Damn right.” It’s missing its usual luster. Ginny leans her head against Hermione’s shoulder. “I love her so much, Hermione. I don’t know what I’d do if something happened to her.” Hermione kisses Ginny’s head and tries not to wince. After Cho’s death and Harry’s despondency, Ginny revealed her fear of Luna dying to Hermione._

_“She probably found something interesting.”_

_“Probably.” She hopes it’s true. She hopes she just found something fantastical, something beautiful, and she forgot to tell the rest of them. There's a possibility of her falling and hurting herself, getting lost, or worse yet; being hurt by someone. She doesn’t voice it and neither does Ginny. She knows Ginny is thinking it. If someone were to ever hurt Luna, Hermione doesn’t doubt Ginny would kill them on the spot. Law and gods be damned._

_“You’ll never guess where I found her.” Ron sounds amused as he calls out to them._

_“You look like a mess.” Ginny’s sigh of relief tells her Luna is safe._

_“I found a goblin in the bushes.”_

_“That’s a kitten with matted fur.”_

“Hermione?” It’s Bellatrix who found her. After her reaction to the ship, Hermione hadn’t expected her down here. 

“I’ve just been fooling myself.” She still feels cold from the sea water, cold from her realization and her memories, too cold. Bellatrix pulls Hermione into her embrace and holds her tight, tighter than Hermione could hold herself. She lets herself sag against Bellatrix, trusting her to hold her.

“What happened?”

“The water won’t help me. I can’t sail home.” Bellatrix rubs circles on her back as she comes to terms with her inability to leave. Nagini keeps bumping against her, trying to comfort her. 

“You won’t be stuck here. Draco or Tonks will just have to go with you.” Hermione straightens up.

“I couldn’t make them go!”

“It’s hardly making them go. They’ve been here their entire lives, they’re eager to leave. To see the world. They can sail.” 

“But-”

“Don’t worry. We can call the others to the courtyard.” She hears the finality in Bellatrix’s tone and lets the subject go. She still needs to see to the washed up man.

“You go ahead, I’ll come meet you in a bit.” 

“You’ve got something more important to do?”

“I need to clean up.” She knows she must look a fright by now.

“Speaking of...why are you soaking wet?”

“Decided to go for a swim.”

“In your clothes?”

“Of course.”

Bellatrix pauses, the judgement clear, but she stands to leave Hermione to her business. Hermione does wipe her face off but she hurries to gather her supplies and bring them back to the man.

He isn’t awake when she gets into the cave so she leaves them within his reach in case she isn’t back for a while. She presses a hand to his chest and is worried at how hot he already is. A fever must already be kicking in. If he lives, it won’t be an easy few days. 

It’s possible he could guide them out of here. That way she wouldn’t have to take Draco or Tonks away from their family. She can’t count on him. He’s a relative stranger and as much as she hates to admit it, his odds aren’t great. She can’t count on him living.

She knows Draco and Tonks are curious about the world but she knows how much taking them would hurt the others. Andromeda and Narcissa love their children, they’ve raised them and watched over them for centuries. Bellatrix loves them like their her own. She cared for them just as long. If she leaves with their children and their ship she isn’t sure how she’ll forgive herself. 

It’s like she’ll be gutting Bellatrix. The further they sail away with that which matter to Bellatrix, the further it will pull her insides out. 

Narcissa and Andromeda’s reaction will also likely be something to behold. They don’t know her plans to leave. Not only will she be revealing her intentions to leave to them but also her intentions to take Draco and Tonks with her. She hopes Bellatrix won’t let anything happen to her. 

She has to go. She has to face them. Draco and Tonks are her last chance at leaving. She owes it to all of them to be up front about it.

“Keep me in your thoughts, stranger.”


End file.
